


Slain By Fire, Sped By Flame

by GodmotherToClarion



Series: Sped By Flame [1]
Category: Free!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Royalty, Alternate Universe - Splash Free, Arabian AU, Arranged Marriage, Better Than Canon, Dancing, F/M, Festivals, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Good, Happy Ending, Haru's never seen a pool before, Illustrated, M/M, POV Third Person, Tournaments, Wedding Planning, Wedding Rings, Weddings, because people get married, blame the mackerel, did I mention weddings?, everyone leaves the planning to Rin and he's sick of it, only Ran knows what she wants, seriously they're all best friends, written pre-s3 so Isuzu is called Sakura
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2018-08-24
Packaged: 2018-12-24 14:30:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 258,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12014736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GodmotherToClarion/pseuds/GodmotherToClarion
Summary: In which Haru and Makoto are Arabian princes, brought together by the fires of drought and an alliance between their kingdoms.(Or, a pair of fools take far too long to fall in love, and everyone else is along for the ride).Now with illustrations by alsas!





	1. A Tale of Three Brothers

Prince Haruka of Iwatobi had lived as near a quiet life as it was possible for a member of the royal family to lead. 

Of course, it was the circumstance of his birth that had granted him this gift, the good fortune that had so markedly passed over his elder cousin Akihiro. Haruka was the only child of Prince Tamotsu and his wife, the Princess Kazumi. Tamotsu, being the younger brother of the Emperor Hiromasa, was as just as fortunate as his serious son; he served as his brother’s closest advisor and confidant, as Haruka did even then for Akihiro, but neither the eldest prince nor his often absent-minded child would ever have to sit a day upon the throne. 

Akihiro was twenty-four years old to Haruka’s nineteen, and the two could not have been closer had they been born of the same parents. Haruka’s very first memories were not of his adoring parents, but of a dark-haired brother with cobalt eyes the same shape and shade as his own. Out of their childhood camaraderie had grown the brotherhood that bound them together to the day. Akihiro was tall, easily beloved, and possessed of a tender concern for every last subject of his desert kingdom—all traits that well-befitted the heir to the emperor’s seat. Haruka was quieter, reluctant to converse with the court, yet careful and steady with his judgements when he sat across the table from his cousin long into the night with plans and proposals spread between them, completing letters of state and military orders with a much-overworked hawk’s quill. 

And Iwatobi and its rulers were content, with hardly a care in the world—until the drought began. 

At first, it brought the kingdom little worry, for the rains rarely arrived longer than a week or so late. But that year, the summer storms began a fortnight later than expected, and Hiromasa and Tamotsu exchanged anxious glances over the supper table when they ended a fortnight early. The Queen and Princess consulted the court astrologers and returned in a state of near-panic when they were gravely informed that the rains were unlikely to continue. 

Iwatobi would simply be receiving no more water for the next six moons at least. 

The following month, the emperor and his brother were summoned to the below-ground storage chambers where the water was stored from one monsoon to the next. The keeper of the keys, long-bearded Asahn, wrung his hands as he let fall the blow; the kingdom could not hope to endure until the winter storms. Hiromasa turned to his brother, barely-veiled despair struggling in his gaze.

“Do not worry, brother,” said Tamotsu in an even voice, taking the role of the elder for the first time in their lives. “We have allies to whom we can turn for the sakes of our people, pride be damned.”

Envoys rode out to the neighboring kingdoms the very next day, to Sikandar and Atar Qasr, to Ram-Susah and Tirah Alis. One by one, they returned, expressing sincere regret, for the surrounding sultanates were in nearly the same state—while better off, they truly could not spare even a drop of that year’s meager bounty. Hiromasa grew ever-more careworn as the horsemen from Sikandar and Tirah Alis and then Ram-Susah returned with nearly identical answers, and he had not even the slightest thought of hope when a weary-looking servant knocked at the door of the royal apartments one night two weeks later, announcing the arrival of the emissary from Atar Qasr. 

“Kaguya, my dear,” he said, receiving the sealed letter that the boy had given him, “would you draft an answer to King Masoto?” 

The queen answered him with a soft touch upon his cheek, taking the envelope and breaking the sea-green clod of wax, stamped with the image of a slender willow. She slid the letter—written upon a fine cream-colored vellum in a bold, black hand—and scanned the elegant script, her eyes widening as they progressed further and further down the page.

“Hiro,” she said urgently, crossing to his side and shaking his shoulder. “Hiro—they have offered their aid.”

The emperor’s eyes widened, seeming for a moment to lack all comprehension of what she had said. 

“You recall that earlier this year they acquired the state of Martulah, do you not—the forest nation that lies opposing them, over the mountains? Martulah has received plentiful rains, for they are a farming land, and while we shall surely lose much of the harvest this year, they are willing to supply us with food and enough water to keep us well.”

Hiromasa barked a laugh, taking his wife in his arms and waltzing her about the room. “Praise the Gods! Oh, what a wise boy that Tamotsu is! I swear, he shall never let me live this down—that I stood gaping at him like a fool while he set Aki and Haru to writing letters!”

“Be that as it may,” said Kaguya primly, righting her rumpled veil and extracting herself from her husband’s disappointed grasp. “There is still the question of what we shall give them in return. You know as well as I that Masoto will never dream of asking a thing from Iwatobi, but his subjects are a different story.”

Hiromasa stopped suddenly, for he had not thought that far ahead. Such a gesture would surely demand repayment, and Iwatobi was in no position to offer anything of worth to Masoto’s kingdom. If the good-natured sultan received nothing for his gift, his subjects might even grow discontented enough to rebel...and Hiromasa refused to be the indirect cause of such an event. “Exactly,” nodded Kaguya, turning her eyes back to the letter. “I doubt Masoto has addressed the question, for he is far too good-natured.”

“You have not even finished his note?” teased Hiromasa, not quite robbed of the cheer that had filled his heart, even at the pressing truth that he had nothing with which to repay his fellow monarch. Kaguya paid him no mind, for she was still reading, but the gasp that filled the room a moment later left the emperor with no doubt that the ruler of Atar Qasr  _ had  _ addressed the issue in the second page of the epistle. 

“What has he said?” asked her husband, curiosity aroused at the blank look of shock on the queen’s face. Wordlessly, she held the sheet up close to his face. He took it from her with a questioning look—only to be replaced by a thunderstruck one as he read.

_ Taking our recent acquisition of Martulah into consideration, we are well-aware that this complicates the age-old custom of returning something of equal value when one kingdom receives a gift from another. Though we will by no means be ceasing trade, we are now far-more self-sufficient than we have been of old, and while we had not the slightest moment of doubt in offering our aid, we were at a loss as to what we could receive from you that would permit our people to rest easily.  _

_ It was then that my wife reminded me that your younger brother, Prince Tamotsu, has a son who has yet to reach his twentieth year. As your own son is of age and betrothed, your kingdom is assured an heir, but we have not yet made matches for any of our three children. My eldest son, the crown prince Makoto, has been occupied with his training. Our twin son and daughter, Prince Ren and Princess Ran, have not been affianced either, for they have only recently passed their twelfth birthdays. _

_ Thus, the Queen Natsuko and I ask for your nephew’s hand on the behalf of our daughter, and that if your brother and his wife give their assent to the match, their son should spend a period of time here in Atar Qasr yearly until the princess is of age to wed. It is our hope that this union is as promising to you as it is to us, and should the throne receive an heir from either of my sons in future, we shall have no objection to Princess Ran dwelling in Iwatobi with your nephew after the marriage.  _

_ May the blessings of the Gods be upon you, _

_ Masoto, Sultan of Atar Qasr. _

It was with glad hearts that Haruka and Akihiro heard of Atar Qasr’s promise the next morning. The word was delivered by the violet-eyed serving boy who had been with them since their childhood—a well-built lad called Rei Ryuugazaki, whose father was the emperor’s own manservant. He had torn into the princes’ sleeping chambers not long after dawn, stripping the bedclothes from their slumbering forms and shrieking the news in their ears. Akihiro took a good-natured swipe at the boy before sitting bolt upright and joining in the din with a joyous shout of his own. Haruka merely pushed himself up on his elbows and smiled a rare smile at his cousin and friend, who were leaping about the room with their arms around each other’s shoulder. The relief swept over him like a wave and he turned his cheek to the sateen pillowcase, vainly clutching at sleep. Rei brushed Akihiro off and shook his head at Haru. 

“Your parents have requested both of you in the council chambers to discuss the terms of the agreement with Atar Qasr, Haru,” said Rei. “You and Aki ought to dress as swiftly as you can and go down. The emperor will call the gathering to order soon, if he hasn’t already.”

Grumbling, Haruka sat up and stumbled over to the wash-stand, scrubbing his face and hands before picking up a fresh stick of neem and chewing the end into a brush, scouring his mouth with the rough bristles and spitting into the slop jar when he had finished brushing his teeth. Akihiro followed suit, before the two of them crossed to the cupboard where their ceremonial suits were kept. Aki mused for a while on which to pick, finally settling on a scarlet and gold robe with black dragons embroidered at the waist. Haru, as the younger prince, chose one of his favorites: a flowing garment in jewel-like hues of blue and sea-green silk, with silver stitching at the neck and sleeves. Rei, who was dressed in his own best, nodded in approval as he fetched a tiny black pot of kohl. He lined each prince’s eyes with the stuff, and stepped back with a decisive look of satisfaction.

“Are we not to have breakfast before the meeting?” asked Haru as he and Akihiro followed Rei down the stairs. The shorter prince was already thinking of the dried-fish paste served with every morning meal, and inwardly sighed at the thought that he would have to do without it until the morrow. 

“Your mothers instructed me to bring you both without delay,” said Rei apologetically. “And with as much as there is to discuss, I doubt the council will break until noon.”

Haruka nodded. He had expected as much—after all, not even Aki was better-versed in the ways of the court, for his aunt and uncle had waited to introduce his cousin into politics until Haru was deemed fit to join him. It was the custom; his uncle had not been permitted into the council chamber until his own father was ten years old and old enough to sit by his brother’s side. 

When they reached the chamber, Rei bowed to the princes and swung open the door before filing off to the front of the room, where he took his place beside his father and the two ladies-in-waiting that accompanied Haruka’s mother and aunt. Haru and Aki followed to the top two places at the left and right sides of the long table: Aki sitting at his mother’s left hand and Haru at his mother’s right. Once the heavy doors had closed behind them, Hiromasa cleared his throat and stood. 

“As you have all heard, the royal family of Atar Qasr has consented to give us water and supplies to carry the kingdom through until the next rainy season.”

A cheer broke from councilmen and women up and down the table, and Hiromasa and Tamotsu allowed themselves to smile despite the furrows in their brows. 

“There is no further threat to our people.” said Hiromasa, the grin fading away and the frown growing deeper. Aki and Haru gazed up at him in confusion, wondering what could still be troubling when they had watched him go about his duties as if he hardly knew what he did, ever since the monsoon had ended. 

“Yet there is one last question to be settled.” Tamotsu was speaking now, and Haruka felt a weight slide into his stomach at the tone of his father’s voice. He exchanged looks with his cousin across the table, finding that the older boy looked just as nonplussed as he. 

“That is the question of our debt to Atar Qasr, and how we are to repay it.”

Haru’s heart sank, and another quick glance at Aki proved that the other prince’s had likely done the same. The two boys heard murmurs echoed throughout the room, most of them along the lines of  _ Gods above, what might we possibly give after this year?  _ Some of the more pessimistic among them seemed to have taken it into their heads that Atar Qasr had demanded that Iwatobi surrender its rule to the larger nation, and were on their feet, pleading with the king and queen to reconsider. Hiromasa quelled them with a single look, and they resumed their seats, abashed. 

“Peace, friends. Masoto is not such a hard man as that. Furthermore, he has only recently taken rule of a smaller province which desired Qasr’s military protection. He needs no more territories, and neither does he want them. Yet that has made the question of repayment an even more pressing one, and one that we were obliged to consider carefully before we could think of accepting the solution that the sultan and his queen proposed.”

“Haruka, my son, rise.”

It was his own mother who was speaking now, the emperor having seated himself again. Haru stood, his knees trembling slightly before he forced them into stillness and lowered his gaze respectfully before meeting the princess’s eyes. 

“Nine years ago, on your tenth birthday, you and the crown prince swore an oath to do whatever you could to protect this kingdom and its people.” Tamotsu was standing as well, and Haru pressed his hands against his legs, entrapped in yards of silk, in a vain attempt to quiet their shaking. “Do you remember your promise?”

“I do, Father,” said Haru in a voice hardly above a whisper. “And whatever it is that is required of me...I will strive to uphold my word.”

“The Sultan of Qasr well recognizes our plight,” said Kazumi, her eyes softening as they took in the sudden determination that filled the fluid lines of the prince’s body. “And so they have not asked us for our gold or for future harvests...they have asked for your hand, on behalf of their daughter, Princess Ran.”

“Your mother and I are in full agreement to the union, as are His Majesty and the Queen,” said Tamotsu, his heart suddenly aching for his child. “But we would never give assent to this match without your consent, my son.”

Haru’s eyes were briefly lidded. He had always known that the possibility of a betrothal might linger in his future. After all, if Iwatobi was to send either of its princes outside its borders to marry, it would certainly not be Akihiro, for Aki would be emperor some day. While the idea of marrying this unknown princess did not necessarily disturb him, the thought of parting from his family and his tiny circle of friends felt like a death, and Haruka was sure that it was plain upon his face. He relaxed his muscles into coolness once again as he spoke. 

“I give my consent freely, Father,” he said, astonished at the resolve he heard in his own voice. “I will wed the Princess Ran.”

A proud look passed between Hiromasa and Tamotsu, and Kaguya and Kazumi’s eyes blurred with tears before the two women blinked them away. 

“You need not expect to be married, nor to make Atar Qasr your home, for at least the next six years,” Hiromasa said, nodding to his nephew to be seated. “Princess Ran is but twelve years of age, and may not be wed until she is eighteen at the least. But her father has asked that you spend a quarter of each year at the palace with his family until that time, so that you and your bride will not be strangers to each other upon your wedding.”

“It is Masoto’s hope that while the marriage is not fully of yours nor his daughter’s choosing, the two of you will grow to be fond of each other through the next several years and live the rest of your lives in contentment,” said Kaguya, who clearly approved of this particular part of the arrangement. “Will you agree to the sultan’s request, my Prince?”

“I do,” nodded Haru, the sickly chill that had gathered in his chest dissipating.  _ Six _ _ years.  _ His feverish visions of being placed into a palanquin the following month and borne away from Iwatobi scattered like stars before the sun, and he found that he could breathe easily and fully once more.  

“There is one more thing, my nephew,” said the emperor, “While you must certainly expect to dwell in Atar Qasr for a time at least, the sultan has promised that you may return home to Iwatobi with the Princess the moment he receives an heir through either of his sons, the elder of whom is near Akihiro in age.”

At this last, Haruka raised his head and met his uncle’s eyes. While some part of him had always hoped to meet the one he was destined for, he understood that this particular concession was one that he could hardly have escaped. But this, the sweet promise that he would never have to turn his back upon Iwatobi—upon his family—for life, had erased the last vestiges of protest within him, and he found himself strangely eager for his first trip to Atar Qasr.

“Then shall we write to the sultan to seal the betrothal, my son?” asked Tamotsu. 

“Yes, my father,” said Haru. “And perhaps—if it is not improper for me to do so before our meeting—I might enclose a letter of my own to the Princess Ran?”

The young prince started as applause sounded throughout the room, lines smoothing away from even the most fretful-looking of faces in the council chamber.

“Certainly you may, my boy,” said Kazumi, pride ringing in her own voice.

Akihiro sprang up and circled the table, catching his cousin in a forceful embrace. Haru tottered where he stood, before feeling a smile quirk at his lips as he wrapped his arms around the older boy. He sensed a hesitant touch at his shoulder; Rei had padded over to his side, and as Aki stretched out a hand and drew the lad into the hug, Haru felt the soothing warmth of his mother’s arms about his shoulders, and then the approving ruffle of his uncle’s hands and his father’s in his hair. Kaguya’s silken fingers brushed his cheek and she gave him a kiss on the brow. 

“How you have grown, Haru,” she said, her thick voice hardly veiling tears. “Never do you cease to do us proud.”

And as Haru closed his eyes and rested his chin upon Aki’s shoulder amid tumultuous cheers from the congregation, his mind was filled with the inimitable peace of a duty faithfully fulfilled. 

III. 

After the meeting, Aki and Haru had their luncheon in near silence; the only conversation to pass between them was of the public audience the following day, and the petitions that had been submitted to the palace in advance. At last, tiring of the quiet, Rei spoke up from his place at Haru’s left. 

“Are you truly willing to do this, Haru?”

“I am,” said Haruka, still astonished at the truth. “After all, look at Lord Aichirou and Lady Hanamura. Their betrothal was settled by their parents, and they are truly happy with one another.”

“That is not quite the same,” ventured Akihiro, resting his chin upon his folded hands. “Ai and Hana grew up together, and I do not doubt they would have married anyway.”

“You and Jun, then?” asked Haru, referring to Akihiro’s intended, whom he was to marry year after next. 

“Jun and I still hardly know each other,” sighed Aki, and the younger two understood at once that the crown prince wished it could be otherwise. “But we like each other well enough...does a marriage need much more to be a happy one?”

“I suppose not,” Rei conceded. “But you and Jun are close in age, as are Ai and Lady Hana. The Qasr princess is only a child.”

The color drained from Haru’s face, and Aki turned a stern look upon Rei. 

“When they marry, she will be eighteen  _ at the least _ , and only a year younger than Haru is now—and Haru will still be a young man.”

The three boys fell quiet once more, until Akihiro spoke again. 

“Haru...I have been thinking. You are due to depart for your first visit three weeks hence, are you not?”

“Yes,” nodded Haru. 

“It might grow lonely,” said Aki gently, “I met the sultan of Atar Qasr once, on a state visit before you were born. He is a good man, and his wife and children must be no different, but that does not alter the truth that you will be in a foreign land without us.”

Haru’s stomach clenched, and he lowered his gaze. “It is only for three moons, Aki. I can bear it.”

“I am sure you can,” Aki’s voice was warm, and he placed a hand on his cousin’s shoulder. “But  _ I  _ cannot rest easily at the thought of it.”

“What would you propose?” asked Haruka, taking a draught of pale-coloured palm wine. 

“I cannot accompany you, for Father has said that it is high time for my courtship with Jun to begin, now that you will soon be commencing your own,” said the prince morosely. “But Rei has no pressing duties to keep him in Iwatobi, and so he shall travel with you. His parents do not object, and you will be happier for the company.”

Rei’s eyes widened at the prospect of journeying to such a kingdom as Atar Qasr, his wire-framed spectacles flashing as he envisioned the novel lessons of history and custom that awaited him. Aki laughed. 

“Would you like to go, Rei?”

“If I might, Highness,” whispered Rei, reduced simultaneously to flushing and stuttering. 

“Then it is settled,” said Haru, cheer returning to the table. “When the caravan leaves, Rei will go with me.” The three young men smiled at one another: Rei in pure joy, Haru in relief, and Akihiro in a strange amalgamation of melancholy and pride. 

“My little cousin is a man now.” Aki choked over sudden tears, wiping his eyes with the backs of his hands. “It seems like yesterday that you and I were in short pants and taking falls during riding lessons.”

“ _ I  _ took no falls,” said Rei smugly. “Such a thing would hardly have been beautiful.”

“Yes, yes,” said Aki, rolling his eyes. “You are perfection itself, and have never suffered the indignity of tumbling off a pony. But Heaven knows Haru did, and here he is before me, less than a month away from journeying off to meet his bride.”

“I beg of you, contain yourself at the festival tonight,” Haru groaned, draining his glass and turning his attention to the salted fish, which Lord Aichirou had kindly saved for him from breakfast. 

“Certainly not,” teased the elder, pushing his plate aside and rising to his feet. “Come, Rei. Tonight I must take care not to overshadow the happy groom, so you will need to choose our robes for us.”

“I have already chosen them, Aki,” said Rei patiently, extracting a bone from the back of his mouth. “The blue and gold brocade is laid out on Haru’s bed, and I put the purple silk with silver stitching beside yours. Now seat yourself and let me finish my meal, for I am as famished as Haru is.”

Having had his fill of curried lamb, the young man shook his head and departed, leaving the other two behind. Never one to be parted from Aki for long, Haru finished a moment later and left in pursuit of his cousin with Rei at his heels. 

The rest of the afternoon was given up to the arduous preparations for the gathering that evening. As the princes’ personal manservant, Rei had no further duties beyond readying the pair of them, but that was no small task. Aki and Haru drew two baths in the large bathing-chamber adjacent to their bedroom, while Rei rushed off to have his own, returning a quarter of an hour later with damp locks, a basketful of tiny vials, and (inexplicably) what appeared to be a pair of rough-looking scrubbing brushes. 

“What are those for?” asked Haru, eyeing them warily as Rei added goat’s milk soap to the tubs and liberal amounts of scented oils. Akihiro preferred the flowery fragrances of jasmine and lavender, while Haruka would bathe with nothing but almond oil.

“Get in,” ordered Rei, eyeing the streaks of sweat and dirt upon the princes’ backs in despair—it was more than evident that they had been out riding the previous afternoon. Recognizing the no-nonsense tone, Akihiro vaulted into his tub at once, sinking back into the perfumed suds with a sigh. Haru climbed into his own with poor grace, wishing that the water was cooler. Rei armed himself with one of the brushes and advanced toward Akihiro with a determined look. The crown prince sighed and submitted meekly to being scrubbed from head to foot, while Haru sulked in the other tub with his chin drawn up to his knees, splashing gloomily as he awaited his turn. 

Rei knew how to work quickly, and soon he was turning to Haruka with a glint in his eye. Haru shook his head and sank beneath the bubbles, only to emerge a moment later with a yelp as Rei pulled him out by the neck. 

“Not today, Haru,” he said sternly, lathering the second brush and scouring the prince’s skin until it was pink. When he deemed his master to be satisfactorily clean, Rei retreated into the next room to dress in his own ceremonial clothes. Akihiro followed shortly after, and Haru promptly heard a cry from his cousin in the outer chamber as he complained that the slippers Rei had chosen did not match his gown. Haru lingered in the tub for a minute or so longer, lulled almost to sleep by the faint sweet smell of rose attar that drifted from the water. However, his peace was quickly interrupted by Akihiro, who stormed in and dragged him bodily out into the dressing room, ignoring his cousin’s vehement protests. As Haru opened his mouth for yet another complaint, Rei and Aki pointed him sternly to the ornate brocade robe that lay on his bed. Defeated, Haru dried himself and tugged them on, pausing for a split second to admire his reflection in the glass that hung opposite them. 

Rei had chosen well; the iridescent blue fish embroidered upon the shimmering gold silk set off his cobalt eyes magnificently, and the robe itself seemed to throw an aureole of golden light about his inky hair. Aki laughed, halfway through the process of clambering into his own robe, which beautifully suited the darker hue of his skin. Haru looked like a spectre in purple. 

“You look well, cousin,” said Akihiro sincerely. “I doubt you shall have any trouble winning Princess Ran’s heart in Atar Qasr.”

Haru sighed and fidgeted as he sat before the mirror, giving no answer to Aki’s remark. The cousins sat in silence as Rei fetched their jewels: silver set with amethyst and moonstones for Akihiro, and sapphires set in gold for Haru. For the first time in their lives, Haru’s garments were more elegant and brightly coloured than Aki’s, and the sight of his vibrant cousin in muted violets and silver seemed simply too unnatural to be permitted. Rei stood back, well-pleased with the effect. Haruka raised his eyes to meet those of his reflection and drew in a breath. 

A single gold necklace hung about his throat, rather than a wealth of finely-linked chains. It winked almost like a living thing, a vine of desert blossoms with sapphires at their hearts. Long bobs hung from his ears, almost brushing his shoulders, and an ornate forehead-piece rested upon his brow, bearing the royal seal. Akihiro came forward with three rings, two of which he slid onto his cousin’s right hand on the last upon his left. Haru hardly paid them any mind, for he was keenly aware that in the lamplight, he was as beautiful as a gem himself. Tinkling gold bangles hung from his wrist, nearly up to his elbows, yet well below the cropped sleeves of the gown.

Shaking himself away from the image in the glass, Haru turned toward Aki and Rei, and found himself struck speechless by how  _ different  _ they seemed. Aki’s eyes, usually identical to Haru’s own, appeared to have darkened to violet, and the moonstones and pearls that encrusted his hands and forearms cast a softer aura about his cousin than Haruka was used to seeing. All of Akihiro’s boldness and bluster was still, and some glimmering vein of calm, buried deep within the older boy, had risen to the surface instead. Rei, who was usually clad in the scarlet turban, white trousers, and gold-and-purple vest of a palace manservant, was dressed fully dark blue satin, with the images of suns and stars and planets embroidered upon his robes in crimson. The younger boy often looked harried—he spent most of his days keeping the incorrigible princes in check, after all—yet the eyes that met Haru’s were oddly tranquil, washed clean of cares, and Haru turned back to his own reflection in mild panic, wondering how the day had changed him. 

“We hardly seem like ourselves to-night, do we?” Akihiro put his feet into velvet slippers.

“No, we do not,” Rei agreed, pushing his spectacles further up the bridge of his nose. “But we certainly are more beautiful than usual.”

“Shall we go, Haru?” teased Aki, setting his hands on his hips as he glared playfully at his cousin. “Or have you chosen to woo yourself in the mirror tonight instead?”

Haru shook his head and followed the other two from the room, the lilting strains of music growing louder and deeper as they went along the emptying passageways. Finally, they emerged into the great inner courtyard, which bloomed with lamps and torches below the clear, dizzying light of the stars. 

Haru and Aki made their way to the high table, sitting on either sides of their fathers this time. The festivities seemed to have been going on for a short while, but the dais was empty of lords and ladies of the court, and Kazumi turned teary eyes to her son as she took her own seat.

“You look so dashing, Haru,” she said, laughing even as a sob lingered in her throat. Haru grasped her hand for a moment and then relinquished it. Over the next half-hour or so, more guests filtered in, taking their places and filling the courtyard with echoes of laughter and conversation. At last, the King stood. 

“My beloved subjects,” he said solemnly, “it is our great relief to inform you all that Atar Qasr has consented to aid us until the next rain.”

Deafening cheers filled the courtyard, and quieted when the emperor held up a hand. 

“As part of the agreement between myself and the sultan of Qasr, Prince Haruka has been promised in marriage to the sultan’s only daughter, and the two shall wed when she comes of age.”

Another storm of applause took the congregation, and Haru glimpsed Aki beaming at him from the seat three places to his right. 

As Hiromasa opened the festivities, Haru found that he felt suddenly removed from these people amongst whom he had lived his nineteen years— _his_ people—those whom he had been meant to govern all his life at Akihiro’s side. Despite the sultan’s promise that he should never have to leave Iwatobi for good after his wedding, a foreboding thought seemed to whisper that his beloved home would not remain his home for long. He attempted to calm himself with the knowledge that his marriage would not be for many years, yet the treacherous voice murmured that even this would be proven false in time. 

Later that night—or early the next morning, Haru supposed—he, Aki, and Rei went slowly back to their chambers, their eyes red with tiredness and Haruka’s feet heavy in golden samite slippers. Aki did not even bother to undress before flinging himself into bed, and Rei rolled his eyes and went to the armoire in search of the crown prince’s nightshift. Haru disrobed with trembling fingers and tugged on his own sleeping garments one-handed before helping Rei remove Aki’s gown and hang it safely out of harm’s way. With Akihiro dressed in his nightclothes and tucked beneath the covers, Rei bowed briefly to Haruka. 

“Is there anything more you need before you retire, Haru?”

“No, Rei. You should rest.”

Recognizing the dismissal, his younger friend nodded and made off toward his own bedroom, leaving the quiet prince alone on the settee in the middle of the room. The previous night, he had been scarcely able to sleep with worry over the drought, and he felt sure that slumber would elude him this night, as well. Looking around the familiar chamber, his eyes resting momentarily upon Akihiro’s sleeping figure, he knew that he hovered on the brink of some great alteration...one whose depth he had not the wisdom to understand. Aki would soon begin his courtship, and not long after that, he too would marry...leaving behind these familiar chambers for a new and richer life. There would be but two boys in this room, which had for nineteen years played nursery, study, infirmary, and play-room to three. Haru could hardly console himself in the thought that Rei would be accompanying him to Atar Qasr, for the prospect of losing Akihiro had struck him anew, like a blow long looked for, but no less wrenching when it fell. 

Heaving a soft sigh, he pushed himself to his feet and padded over to his own bed, slipping between the covers just as a single tear slid from his left eye and rolled slowly down his cheek. He let his eyelids fall shut, and found with some surprise that sleep threatened to take him at once, despite the aching weight of his heart. Haruka felt as if he had aged twenty years since the council meeting the previous morning, and his last conscious thought was a powerful wish that the drought had never come.

As he slept, his visions were not uneasy ones. Haruka dreamed of a deep pool, tiled with smooth stone and covered in lotus flowers. He saw chattering streams and a clear blue lake pale with swans, as well as a pair of children weeping in each other’s arms. Haru stretched out a hand to comfort them, but they were gone in a heartbeat, leaving behind a white fur cloak with dark patches upon the hide. He dreamed of palaces carved from living rock and a great copper basin filled with scarlet roses floating upon icy water. The pictures passed through his mind like silk through his fingers, leaving not a trace that they had ever been. 

When Haru woke well past noon, the only memory he held of the vivid night was a fading glimpse of gentle eyes as green as the sea.  

 


	2. Upon the Other Side

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Introducing the Qasrians (every last one).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to chat about the fic, get sneak peeks of upcoming chapters, or do fanart or illustrations! 
> 
> [Godmother To Clarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/)

The following days were busy ones for Haru, for he, Aki, and Rei were taken up with the preparations for his departure. Three mornings after the leaving feast, Haru awoke to find the cupboard doors hanging ajar and every one of his ceremonial robes lying out upon desks, chaises, and on Aki’s dressing table. Akihiro himself was nowhere to be seen, but Rei stood in the centre of the room, clutching his tangled forelocks as he gazed about the chamber in anguish.

“Rei?” asked Haruka warily, pushing back the covers and rising from the bed. “What in Heaven’s name are you at?”

“Simply sorting your gowns, Haru,” sighed Rei, looking disconsolately at a black sateen robe embroidered with delicately stitched butterflies. “You are journeying to Atar Qasr as a bridegroom, and fewer than a quarter of these are worthy of your position.”

“Which ones have you chosen, then?” asked Haru with mild interest.

“I selected the one from last night for the engagement ceremony,” said Rei, “to match the colors of the royal seal, and the peacock-feather pattern for your arrival. But the others are either too understated or unfitting for a nobleman ready to be wed.”

Haru frowned, for he understood immediately that Rei spoke the truth. Due to Haruka’s place as the younger prince, he wore robes that signified this duty—more similar in their length and pattern to a boy’s garb than to a man’s. It would not do to journey to his father-in-law’s kingdom dressed like a child, but there was not nearly enough time to engage the palace tailors to make him a new wardrobe.

“Only two,” Haru sighed, looking about at the other robes, which were shorter than his cousin’s. Haruka’s came down to his shins, setting off the narrow tucks of fitted trousers beneath, but the gowns that Akihiro wore fell gracefully to the ground, and some of the more elegant ones even boasted a train.

“Rei,” said Haru, carefully returning the rejected garments to the closet, “how do men of the gentry wear their clothes in Atar Qasr?”

“Nearly identical to ours, I am afraid,” Rei answered. “From what I heard at the servant’s hall during breakfast, the only difference is that their boys give up the short gowns at sixteen instead of twenty.”

Haru threw up his hands in defeat, realizing that not even young men of his own age wore cropped robes in Qasr. “What shall we do, then?”

“Delaying your visit is impossible, but neither can you depart with only these,” frowned Rei, indicating the pair that he had already laid away in a trunk and covered in cassia sachets to ward away moths. “Perhaps there is a seamstress with the skill to— _ Aki! _ ” Rei squeaked and stumbled back onto the skirt of a nearby gown as Akihiro’s heavy hands descended upon his shoulders and knocked him to the ground.

“Your  _ Highness _ ,” began Rei, aggrieved. Akihiro cut him off, eager to escape a scolding.

“What’s all this about robes, then?”

“Mine aren’t suitable for a visiting prince, as you won’t be coming with me,” said Haru, pointing to the trunk that lay nearly empty upon the woolen carpet. “And worse, Rei says that Qasrian boys change their robes after their sixteenth year, not the twentieth.”

Akihiro laughed.

“What is it?”

“O Haru, have you forgotten that your beloved brother is far more lavish in the matter of dress than you are?” teased the older boy. Rei and Haru exchanged excited glances.

“So you will lend him some of your robes?” asked Rei, mopping away the stray drops of sweat that had gathered at his brow.

“I rather thought I would be  _ giving _ them—after all, a prince doesn’t celebrate his betrothal every day, and they shall have to be altered for him,” said the young man. “Haru, choose the ones that will suit you best.”

Haru and Rei trailed after Aki to his own cupboard, where the crown prince flung open the doors to reveal a dazzling array of garments in beautiful colors—sunset orange, midnight blue, as crimson as blood and mauve like desert wildflowers. As Akihiro swept past the gowns he wore most often, milder shades revealed themselves to the younger two: jade-green like budding leaves, sand-coloured brocade embroidered with golden thread, and the cloudy pink of budding blush-roses.

“Take twenty, and try them on,” Aki declared, seating himself upon the vanity stool as if it were a throne. “And then we’ll be off to the tailors.”

Haru went without a murmur, removing robe after robe from the closet, donning them in the dressing room, and returning to the main chamber to show them to Rei and Aki.

“That is too broad in the shoulders for you,” said Rei to the mauve robe, “and far too long at the sleeves. We should have to cut them, and it would be a shame to ruin such a beautiful piece.”

“Agreed,” Aki nodded. “Now the blood-red, and for Heaven’s sake, raise the skirts so you don’t trip.”

Both spectators approved of the latter gown, and the process went on until Aki had pressed twenty-five robes upon his cousin. Among them was the scarlet-and-gold that Aki had worn to the council meeting the previous day, as well as nearly half of the sets that were kept for state festivals and petition days. Haru’s favorite was a blue the color of early twilight, slightly lighter than Rei’s hair.

“It becomes you,” said Akihiro, sweeping back Haru’s unruly locks so that he could observe the effect of the robe upon his cousin’s eyes. “It’s nearly as blue as the ocean.”

“I wouldn’t know,” shrugged Haruka, stripping off the gown and handing it to Rei. “I’ve never seen it.”

“Get dressed,” Rei ordered, tossing Haru’s day robe into his arms. “The seamstresses will have to take your measurements before they can do the alterations—you’ve grown nearly two inches since the last garment was commissioned.”

The three boys split the load between themselves and went down to the lower levels, where the craftspeople of the kingdom practiced their art. Rei bypassed most of the tailor’s shops and proceeded straight to the one which sewed the royal gowns worn by the princess and queen.

“Why  _ Mother’s  _ seamstress?” hissed Haru, suddenly conscious of the robes in his arms—especially the tasseled lavender silk with its trailing belt of amethyst and pearls.

“These are some of the finest robes in the kingdom,” said Aki, nose in the air. “Not even  _ Father’s  _ things are as delicate as mine, and I wouldn’t trust my gold embroidery and garnet sashes to any other besides the ladies that sew Mother’s clothes.”

“I thought they were mine now,” muttered Haru, hoisting up the heavy satins with a huff.

“If you don’t promise to treat them gently, I’ll take them all back,” threatened his cousin, holding the precious bundle close to his chest. “And then you can surprise Princess Ran in clothes that match her twin brother’s.”

“All right, I promise not to injure them on pain of death,” sighed the Haru, shaking his head at Rei.

“A fate worse than death awaits the man who puts a stain in my clothes,” said the crown prince. “I shall surrender his name to Aunt Kazumi, and watch her tear him to bits.”

“You certainly didn’t say anything to Her Highness when I burnt a hole through the green chemise with the ironing-pot,” came Rei’s amused tones.

“I wouldn’t breathe a word about you,” laughed Aki, “for Heaven knows you didn’t mean it, but Haru would ruin his own wedding robes on a whim, like as not.” He knocked at the door, drawing back carefully as the echo of quick footsteps pattered up the passageway behind the honey-coloured lath.  It was opened by a sweet-faced woman some four or five years younger than Haru’s own mother. Upon seeing the three boys, she smiled and beckoned them in.

“Now, Prince Aki,” she said, relieving the lads of their burdens and hanging up the gowns one by one on the east wall, “these are to be made over for Haru, are they not?”

“Yes, Aunt Miho,” sang Aki, stooping to kiss the seamstress and springing lightly away with a cry as she hurled a well-aimed shuttle at the small of his back.

“Come, my boy,” she said, ushering Haru into the centre of the room and pointing him to a small wooden stool with white stars worked in crewels on the seat. She made quick work of the measurements, passing a slender tape about Haru’s shoulders, waist, arms, and down the length of his legs. As she worked, she called out the numbers to her husband, a good-natured fellow with cropped yellow hair and a hearty laugh. Aki, Rei, and Haru had loved Miho’s husband from infancy, and had never ceased to call him by the affectionate name they had given him as tots: Uncle Sasa, for his surname of Sasabe. He had been the boys’ tutor until Aki’s coming of age four summers previously, upon which he had taken up tailoring alongside his wife.

“It hardly seems real, does it not?” asked Sasabe, laying the lavender gown upon his work-table and pinning it according to Miho’s measurements. “That our Haruka has found himself a bride?”

“Well, he hardly  _ found  _ her,” Aki was quick to explain, having quickly learned that speaking of the Princess Ran left Haru strangely out of sorts. “You know the details of the agreement with Qasr, Uncle. Neither they nor we have much choice in the matter.”

“Indeed,” said Miho, her sharp eyes observing the dusky shadows above Haru’s cheekbones and his pale forehead, drawn up into a frown. She turned away from him, rapidly scanning the row of gowns.

“Twenty-five in all, then?”

“Will they be finished by the time we depart?” asked Haru, the creases in his brow growing deeper.

“What do you take us for, son?” said the tailor, affronted. “Miho and I will have them ready by this time next week—after all, if they don’t fit you, they’ll have to be taken in again. Now run away, lads, and don’t let me catch sight of you again until you’re sent for.”

The boys departed, each richer by a handful apiece of Miho’s sticky-date pastries and a peppering of kisses from the couple’s baby daughter. Aki stuffed his sweets into his mouth the moment the door fell closed behind them, while Rei folded his own and Haru’s into a handkerchief and tucked the little parcel into his pocket.

“Well, that’s the clothes accounted for,” said Haru, his lips quirking into a small smile as Aki slung an arm about his shoulders. “What shall we do next?”

“The jewels have been seen to,” said Rei, drawing a quill and a roll of parchment from within his robes. “All that remains is the official gift of state to the royal house of Qasr, which the emperor has yet to choose. Then, of course, there the question of the betrothal rings and your courting gift to Princess Ran.”

Haru looked at the other two in a silent plea for aid. Rei threw up his hands and shook his head.

“ _ I  _ have never courted a woman, nor do I intend to,” said the younger boy. “Aki chose one for Jun when he came of age, so he ought to advise you.”

Aki rubbed his chin in thought. “Jun is a nobleman’s daughter, not a royal princess, and the herd of camels we gave her family would hardly do for Haru’s betrothed.”

“It ought to be something I can carry,” said Haru, wriggling away from Aki’s hold and falling back to walk beside Rei. “As she is to be my bride, it would be correct for me to present it to her myself.”

“Indeed,” Rei nodded and made a note of it. “Perhaps jewels would be a more fitting gift. After all, Qasr wants for nothing, and your present must demonstrate your knowledge of the fact.”

“Have you anything that might suit her?” asked Aki. “And how would you choose a gift of attire when you haven’t the slightest idea what she looks like?”

“You journeyed to Atar Qasr as a child, did you not?” asked Rei. “You met her parents, and she must resemble them.”

“Natsuko had hair almost as dark as mine,” said the crown prince, creasing his brow as he tried to recall the nearly-forgotten faces of the sultan and his queen. “and her eyes were of a rather striking colour—greenish-blue. But Masoto’s eyes were as brown as his hair, I remember.”

“The princess could have taken after either of them,” sighed Rei. “Well, no matter. Were their complexions light or dark?”

“Both were fair, I think,” replied Aki.

“Emeralds would suit her well, then,” mused Haruka, idly champing at a pastry. “I’ll go down to the treasury.”

“And we shall follow,” crowed his cousin, rushing down the hall with his train fluttering behind him. Rei raised his eyes skyward, muttered, “Why  _ me _ ?” and followed. Haru snorted and gave chase, and the three lads arrived at the gilded gates belowstairs with scarlet cheeks. Rei doubled over as he fought for breath and glared at the princes.

“Of  _ all  _ people—why  _ me _ —only because Haruka and I are of an age—your  _ Highness,  _ your robe!” The manservant shot upright and cried out in despair at the scuff marks at the end of Aki’s train; Haru had trodden on it in an effort to overtake the elder boy.

A cough from the guards brought them back to attention, and Rei lifted his brows at one of the smaller sentries, who was unashamedly muffling his laughter in his shirtsleeves. Finding himself at the receiving end of a none-too-gentle glare from the princes’ attendant, the little lad clapped his mouth shut and looked imploringly at Akihiro, who ruffled his hair with a grin.

“Oh, don’t be such a fussbudget, Rei,” said Aki. “Kashi, you’ll take us through the vaults, won’t you?”

The boy nodded and held up his hands to one of the elder guards, who offered him a small torch and a paternal smile. Lighting it in the sconce burning upon the wall, Kashi unlocked the treasury gates and motioned Aki and Haru to follow him.

The treasury was tidy and well-lit, and the two princes (with Rei still sulking at their tail) followed the child through room after room, until they had passed the coinage chambers and stood at the door of the treasure-hall. Kashi pulled it open, bowed to the princes, and retreated; Aki and Haru entered the chamber with Rei.

“Let us go about this in an orderly fashion, then,” Rei ordered, already casting his eyes this way and that in search of the slightest hint of green. “I’ll search the south half, and you and Aki split the other between yourselves.”

Aki and Haru did as bidden, filing off to opposite sides of the room and picking their way between the gilded trays bearing piece upon delicate piece. Rei worked more quickly than the others did, and he soon came upon a complete set of gold filigree, hung with tinkling emerald beads that shone like serpents in the torchlight and gleamed under the dancing flame without a touch of blue.

“It’s the loveliest piece I’ve ever seen,” whispered Aki, seemingly spellbound by the warm yellow glow of the heavy necklace and diadem. He brushed a finger across the band of the signet ring, touching the metal with breathless care. “But they do not match the queen’s eyes—perhaps we should look further.”

Something in his words stopped Haru in his tracks, and at once he was held by a fading memory—of a gaze as green as grass, and a face lit from chin to brow by a look as dear as a desert lake—

The young man shook his head slightly. “It is of no concern. This is the one I will have.”

“This is but the first we have found,” said the manservant reasonably; after all, they had entered the chamber five minutes previously. “There is sure to be a better one.”

“This, and no other,” said Haruka, surprising even himself by the steel in his voice. Rei and Aki exchanged quizzical glances over his head (both stood several inches higher than he did) and nodded.

“All right, then,” said Aki. “Should I go to have it packaged?”

“Nay. I—I will do it,” replied the younger prince, pressing a hand to his cheek—oddly warm, he thought—and sank down upon a low stool that sat close at hand. He turned his eyes to the jewels in bemusement. They glimmered upon their satin cushion, indifferent to the ache their presence had wrought in his breast. Haru was aware that he wished no other hand to touch them, none but his, and—

_ Whose? _

He blinked. Aki’s large hand flew within an inch of his nose and Haru drew back, meeting the strong grasp of his manservant’s steady hands.

“You are unwell,” said the crown prince, his voice as anxious as his father’s had been upon the end of the monsoon. He knelt before his cousin, hushing the younger boy’s half-hearted objections, and set his own rough palm upon Haru’s brow.

“He is feverish,” he said quietly, looking up at Rei. “Haru, your hands—”

Rei frowned and dragged the unwilling appendage from Haruka’s lap.

“Clammy, and cold as ice,” he muttered, hissing an oath and pulling Haru gently to his feet. “Come, Aki. I’ll send a handmaiden for the jewels once we settle him in the infirmary.”

The two ignored Haru’s complaints—not blithely, for the remonstrations were as heavy as summer air—and hurried the protesting prince up to the ground level, paying no mind to the little sentry scampering after them. Once Rei had delivered Kashi back to his father, he and Aki took Haru to the healing halls and sat him upon a pallet in a corner. He turned his back to them, only to let out a shriek of indignation as Rei opened his overgown and commenced to measure his pulse.

“Well?” asked Aki, fluttering about the room like a blinded moth.

“Faster than is good for him,” said Rei darkly. “Go fetch a healer. I will remain here.”

Aki bounded off down the passageway, leaving the younger two alone.

“What is worrying you?”

Rei’s voice echoed to the marble ceiling. Haru blinked at him dully, for he had attempted to answer the question himself as he was being rushed away from the treasury.

“I…I don’t know that anything is worrying me,” he admitted, allowing Rei to remove the loosened outer robe and unlace the inner sleeves. “But when I saw the jewels, it was almost as if—as if the one who was to wear them stood before my eyes.”

“And you were afraid?”

“Afraid that the marriage does not frighten me.” said Haru quietly, “The last few days have been wearisome, that is all. I have slept little.”

Aki reappeared with a healer in tow, who took one look at the prince’s flushed cheeks and prescribed a tonic of yarrow and elderberries. After she had measured his pulse and peered at the back of his throat, she ordered that Haru be put to bed with a pitcher of cool water close at hand.

Haru found voice to resist at that, but Aki and Rei would not be swayed. Rei armed himself with the tonic bottle and Aki chivvied his cousin up the stairs to their chambers, where the unfortunate lad was stripped of his day-robes, made to lie quietly for half an hour with damp cloths upon his brow, and then laced into his sleeping garments as if he were a child. He rather hoped that Rei would have forgotten the fever philter, but the manservant held out a spoonful of tonic and a goblet of iced water with such a beseeching look that Haru dared not refuse him.

Aki departed soon after upon a summons from the king, but Rei remained at Haru’s side as he slept, faithfully fanning his master when his breathing grew heavy, and sponging the pale feet with the end of his own sash when they twitched in discomfort at the heat.

By and by, long shadows began to fall in the room. Rei crossed to the high windows and opened them, tying back the curtains to admit the evening breeze. Haru slumbered on, hardly stirring but for a sigh now and then. Satisfied that his charge had recovered, Rei sank into an armchair and pressed his palms to his eyes.

Looking after the princes was tiring work, though he had never admitted it even to himself. He had been brought into their nursery hardly a week after his birth, when Aki was five and Haruka three months old. He had been little more than “baby brother” even to Haru until the two younger lads had turned nine, when Rei was given his official post of manservant. There was little new to him in that; after all, he had been keeping the princes from harm’s way since he himself was old enough to walk, but the older boys grew ever more reckless as they approached manhood, nearly stopping Rei’s heart on occasion with their antics.

With Aki, it was horses. New stallions and mares were often brought in to the palace stables, many of them unbroken. Akihiro’s fondest pastime was to train the wilder stallions, and he had been thrown more often than Rei cared to count. Not even the most serious of falls (the worst of which had resulted in a broken collarbone, wrenched back, and a shoulder knocked loose from the joint) could dissuade him, and Rei spent the better part of his days nursing the crown prince back to health after Aki had attempted to ride the more contrary horses. No remonstrance did even a particle of good—not the emperor’s, not the Queen’s and certainly not Rei’s. Haru was rather unconcerned about the welfare of his elder cousin, for the younger boy still labored under the childish delusion that nothing could do Aki the slightest bit of harm.

And then, of course, there was Haru himself. To Rei’s relief, Haru detested horses, and had never willingly mounted one since the end of his riding lessons. But he worried the manservant in his own way, breathing not a word if he was ill, or excusing himself from supper after supper until he telegraphed his exhaustion to the other two by falling insensible to the floor halfway through a council session. Rei cursed himself even at the thought, and stationed himself beside Haru at mealtimes after that, watching every spoonful as it rose from bowl to mouth and glaring the prince into submission if he dared to leave a plate untouched.

As he watched his troublesome charge turn in his sleep and settle the opposite cheek upon the pillow, Rei let his weary head fall back against the stile of his chair and sighed. He would not trade his life for the world, he thought, nor the princes…for he loved them dearly, and even the carelessness that marked nearly all they did could not alter that.

_ Perhaps Haru will behave himself better in Qasr,  _ he mused—and then laughed.

He sank into slumber not a minute later, and dreamt of a brow-band set with pale blue topaz and a golden head veiled by silk the hue of jade. Unconscious to Haru’s languid greeting as Aki entered the bedchamber, Rei’s lips rose in a soft smile as he whispered—

_ “Beautiful.” _

II.

“And  _ I  _ say the troupe ought to enter from the left side of the hall!” cried the young man, tearing at his thatch of fire-colored hair. “If they come in from the right, it will appear as if they are nothing more than guests until they reach the center of the room.”

“It will be better so,” said the girl at his side, resting a placating hand on his cheek. “Sei, won’t it look lovely? The guests won’t be waiting for a spectacle until the dancers are in place before them.”

“That’s all very well, but—”

“Settle, both of you,” came the amused tones of another lad, who sat at the head of the table. “Seijurou, don’t quarrel with your bride. It’s most unbecoming of a gentleman.”

“Indeed,” laughed the boy beside him, shaking a head of wine-colored locks. “After all, you were the one who braved my wrath and wed my sister. If having the dancers enter from the right pleases her, grit your teeth and obey with a smile.”

Seijurou grinned and wrapped an arm about his wife.

“Will it please you so much, Gou?” he asked, looking tenderly into her russet eyes.

“It would,” smirked the young woman. She flirted her scarlet tresses at her husband, who kissed the tail of satiny hair and capitulated without a murmur.

“Very well, then,” he agreed, making a note upon the long piece of parchment that stretched the length of the table. “The right it is.”

He looked up and turned to his brother-in-law with a questioning glance. “Rin, shouldn’t Nagisa be planning this in my place? After all, he is the head of the dancing troupe.”

“Nagisa is training the others for the closing piece, and the entry isn’t a scripted one,” interrupted the man at the head of the table, hoping to move on to more pressing matters. “Now, there is the question of the feast.” Upon receiving triplet looks of bewilderment, he elaborated. “What do the people of Iwatobi like best?”

“Nothing that we would eat ourselves, I’d wager,” sighed Rin, looking over the bill of fare. “Must we bring out the dried stuff and the pickles, Makoto? I’m sure they’d like to try fresh things while they’re here.”

“They’ll be here for three months,” answered the crown prince, reading the list over Rin’s shoulder. “Our duty for the welcoming feast is to  _ welcome  _ them, not shower them with strange foods on their first night in a foreign kingdom.”

“I pity the prince,” sighed Gou, putting her chin in her hands as she went through the inventory of traded foodstuffs that passed between Atar Qasr and Iwatobi. “After all, he’s probably been fretting about the drought since the rains ended, and since the sultan’s letter arrived, he’s likely been worrying about the betrothal.”

Makoto nodded, a pensive look entering his eyes. “He must have expected one sometime, but hardly on the heels of a drought, that is sure.”

“Poor fellow,” said Seijurou, fervently thanking the gods that he had been blessed with the chance to marry the girl he had loved since the two were children.

“Are you not concerned, Makoto? That he will be marrying Ran…that he is so many years elder to her?” asked Gou anxiously. The cheerful little girl was beloved by her brothers and their friends, and Makoto had been forced to order Rin not to give the hapless visiting prince a beating upon his arrival (to warn him, Seijurou had said).

“How old is he, exactly?” asked Sei, cracking his knuckles. It appeared that any sympathy he held for the princess’s betrothed was gone, and Makoto laid his own palm over the offending hands in a quelling gesture.

“He is younger than all three of us—not even yet a man—so there is nothing to worry you on account of his age,” said the prince, his gentle gaze imploring the other two men to be kind to their guest. “He is only nineteen, and the two are not due to wed for another six or seven years.”

“What’s the lad’s name, then?” asked Rin. “I don’t believe your parents were aware of it when they wrote, only that the emperor of Iwatobi had an unmarried nephew.”

“According to the letter from the emperor’s younger brother, the prince is called Haruka,” said Makoto, speaking the name aloud for the first time. It was a pleasant name, he thought, rather like his own—it had a distinguished sort of sound, befitting a member of the nobility.

“Literally meaning ‘foreign,’ then,” Gou teased, laughing at her own jest. Her husband cast her an indulgent look and immersed himself in his notes, while Rin flicked his eyes at his sister with a groan.

“You couldn’t possibly have thought of a better pun, Gou?”

At this juncture, a small boy with an unruly mop of pale hair entered the room and bowed to Makoto and Seijurou.

“Your Highness, General,” he began in a piping voice, “Her Majesty the Queen would like to see the both of you.”

“Thank you, Hayato,” said the prince, beaming at the little lad. “These preparations were getting rather dull. Rin, Gou—carry on without us. We’ll be back once we’ve spoken to Mother.”

“I’m starting for the royal quarters now,” said Gou, looking at the hour-mark on the large candle that sat before her. “Ran and Ren will be in the schoolroom already, and today’s lesson is a long one.”

“I’d forgotten,” said Makoto sheepishly, turning to his advisor with a pleading look. “Will you stay, Rin? I’ll return within an hour.”

“All right, then,” grumbled the younger man, gathering up the sheaf of papers that his brother-in-law had dropped before him. “But don’t you two dare leave me to finish the planning alone.”

“We would never do such a thing,” swore the prince, giving the general a reproachful stare at the sight of the gleeful look on his face. “You too, Seijurou. Gou will be busy with her own duties until the evening and you’ve been let off duty, so you haven’t an excuse.”

Seijurou nodded and made off, clearly eager to escape the little room, while Makoto followed at a more dignified pace.

The palace of Atar Qasr was a cheery-looking castle, overflowing with golden turrets, balusters hung with embroidered flags, and balconies orange with sunset-colored wallflowers. The windows were usually thrown wide open, the gauzy curtains tied back with shimmering lengths of ribbon. Potted plants stood here and there along the corridors, giving off pleasant fragrances that mingled together into a single heavenly scent, one that left its perfume upon the very skin of those who walked within it.

Makoto rarely hurried through those passages, and the palace knew it; after all, his lanky form rose head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd, and spotting him was no difficult feat. And so it was that as he crossed one of the busier hallways and entered a quieter one, he felt something soft and warm wind about his right ankle, trusting completely that he would slow to a stop at its touch. The young prince stooped to his knees; it was one of the many palace cats, who were exceedingly fond of his gentle caresses—perhaps because he had yet to deny them to any of the castle’s creatures, regardless of how urgently he was needed elsewhere. The white kitten that nosed at his foot was one of the kitchen cat’s litter, and Makoto lifted her up into the crook of his arm with a laugh.

“I’ll take you to the council room with me,” he said, chuckling as the little thing put out a small pink tongue and licked his nose. He quickened his pace after that, hurrying through the turnings and servants’ stairways until he reached the chambers where his parents sat during the day, consulting with nobles, conducting audiences with the townsfolk, and otherwise going about the daily business of the kingdom. The guards standing on either side of the arched oaken doors bowed to him as he passed, and one of the younger soldiers relieved the prince of the purring kitten as he entered the room.

“Makoto!” came the voice of his father, ringing like a temple bell from the high table upon the dais at the north wall. “You took your time, my son. General Seijurou is already here.”

“I am sorry, Father,” said Makoto, bowing low before the sultan. “I—” He was interrupted by a tinkling peal of laughter from his mother, whose sharp eyes had caught a rapid glimpse of the cat before the guard could whisk it out of sight. Makoto’s cheeks darkened, and his parents exchanged a pair of identical grins before they turned back to the flustered prince.

“Well, you are both here now,” said the queen, brushing away the his stammered apologies. “Your father and I wished to inquire about the preparations for the arrival of the party from Iwatobi. How much remains to be done?”

“The new garments for the engagement feast have been finished, and both sets of quarters are ready for the guests,” said Makoto. “I have given Prince Haruka the empty set of rooms next to mine, and there is accommodation for the manservant who will be traveling with him. There are no other attendants among them but for a handful of royal guards, for they are coming with a trading caravan. The guards will remain for two or three weeks, perhaps—Gou has arranged their chambers near the soldiers’ barracks.”

“And the Lady Gou and I assisted Rin in the choosing of a betrothal ring and a gift of dowry,” said the General, with the slightest hint of a frown. “We asked Princess Ran if she wished to aid us in the selection, but she wanted no part in it.”

“At present, we are finishing the bill of fare for the welcoming feast, and that is the last of the planning,” finished Makoto.

“I knew we could trust in you, my son,” said the sultan, offering his son a gentle smile of approval. “I shall keep you no longer. Go and have your luncheon—and you, General.”

The two boys bowed to the royal couple before departing belowstairs to the kitchens, where they procured two large platters of fish cooked in salted mushrooms and purple-hued carrots. Seijurou coaxed one of the under-cooks to surrender a loaf of cream toast and a small sachet of rosemary biscuits before Makoto pried him away, taking their spoils up to the office where they found the faithful advisor still scrawling away at the list of notes. Makoto threw him a grateful look and set one of the plates down before him.

“Ah, dinner,” said Rin, looking up from his parchment. He set down the quill and tore into his meal, tucking away meat and vegetables at a rather alarming pace.

“Don’t eat so quickly,” said Makoto mildly, looking over the work Rin had finished in their absence. “Stewed chicken served with lentil broth? However did you think of that?”

“I went through the trading records and found that two of the caravans that left for Iwatobi over the past year had nearly half the room given up to grains—lentils in particular,” answered the advisor, “and the cooks ought to be ready to butcher the chickens the night before the feast.”

“Snap peas and potatoes with preserved pork and young onions,” read Seijurou, eyeing the page over Makoto’s shoulder. “That rings of a foreign delicacy—have you combined foods from Iwatobi with ours for all of the main dishes?”

“Nearly all,” said Rin, speaking through a mouthful of carrots. “I’ve included a few courses from the groom’s kingdom, of course, and several of our own without alteration.”

Makoto nodded in thanks and went to root about in the chest of drawers for a fresh roll of parchment and a bottle of ink. Having found what he needed, he resumed his seat and began to write out the list of foods anew for the kitchen staff, occasionally taking a spoonful of fish and mushrooms at Rin’s urging.

“You ought to eat your meals, Makoto,” grumbled Seijurou, stuffing one of his biscuits with carrots and waving it threateningly in the prince’s direction. “We might not be on duty, but training resumes three weeks from now and you’ve already missed breaking your fast five mornings in a row.”

The prince took the biscuit and signed his name with a flourish at the base of the parchment, having found all the names of various dishes that Rin had written on bits of paper lying scattered over the table. “I’m taking the list to the kitchen now, Sei. I’ll have my luncheon there.”

“If you don’t, I shall inform the twins,” said the haughty general. Rin barked a laugh as Makoto went white at the thought of worrying his young brother and sister.

After bidding farewell to Sei and Rin, Makoto allowed his feet to carry him down the familiar path to the kitchens, from whence the savory scents of roasting meats and bubbling soups billowed like a song. He had often played there as a child, busy with his building-blocks in a corner while the kitchen-maids fed him succulent tidbits as often as he would accept them, or washed his small hands at the water-pump and gave him a little pat of pastry and a cupful of berries and sugar to make tarts at the scrubbed wooden table.

Makoto slipped through the door, closing it swiftly behind him and trapping the sweet warmth of the ovens within. The head cook turned at the sound, a smile splitting her kindly face from ear to ear as her eyes lit upon the young man.

“Makoto, my lad,” she called, casting a practiced eye over the baking bread as she made her way between the trestles toward him. “Have you and the General finished the bill of fare for the feast?”

“That we have,” laughed Makoto, wrapping his arms about the cook and breathing in the fresh, sharp fragrance of peppermint and cassia washing-soap, as well as the hints of butter and apples from the baking table. He put the little scroll into her waiting palm, watching anxiously as she went through the list.

“Is it too much, Aunt Azar?” he asked, wringing his hands fretfully as she pursed her lips and turned to the spice cupboards. “Rin and I thought that we should have dishes that combined the best of Iwatobi and Atar Qasr for the guests, but if it is too much on such notice—”

“Certainly it isn’t,” said Azar, pinning the list to the peg-board that hung on the opposite wall beside the wide bay-window. “I’ll set the servants to gather up the things that aren’t in the stores, and there is plenty of time to send for goods from Martulah before the delegation arrives.”

“Thank you,” he said, bowing his head to her and springing away with a yelp as she swatted at him with a rolling pin. “Aunt  _ Azar!  _ I only meant to—” The prince’s jaw dropped at the sight of a wooden bowl lined with a checked handkerchief and filled to the brim with apple tarts no larger than his palm. Azar held it out to him with a soft look in her eyes, one which hardly a soul in the palace had not given the beloved prince when his attention was elsewhere.

“Take them up to your quarters and eat them with the twins,” she laughed, ruffling his unruly hair and wondering for a moment how the cheerful, tumbling tot of bygone days had grown into the tall lad who stood before her. She turned back to the ovens, blinking crossly at the sudden tears that had gathered at the corners of her eyes.

“Thank you, Aunty!” Makoto threw his arm about her shoulders in a quick embrace and bestowed an impulsive kiss upon her lined cheek, chortling as she raised the rolling pin again in warning. After covering the pies with another cloth, Azar set the prince’s dinner before him: roasted lamb with bean-broth. Makoto ate quickly, bowing briefly to the cook once he had finished.

He thanked her once more (earning himself a stern tug of reproof at his ear) and departed, making his way to the third level where his own quarters were, close by his younger siblings’ and a floor below his parents’.

From the murmur of childish voices behind the schoolroom door, the prince discerned that Ran and Ren were still at their daily lessons with Gou, reciting them again and again until they had learned them by heart. He knocked upon the worn lath, meeting Gou’s crimson gaze with a sly glance toward the tartlets he held.

“For you and the twins,” he whispered, unable to keep himself from looking past her at the little girl and boy kneeling in the center of the room, bent over their slates like a pair of slender reeds bowing to touch their reflections in a pool. Gou took in a breath at the look in his eyes, which rested upon the twins with such tenderness that a queer little ache arose in her own throat. Clearing it hastily, she called the children to attention, feeling her heart throb yet again as they raised their heads and turned to see their brother beaming in the doorway, holding out a bowl which sent the tempting fragrance of fruit and pastry wafting into the air.

“ _ Onii-chan!”  _ The cries in themselves spoke volumes to Makoto—he knew at once that the two had missed him terribly through the forenoon, that they had been waiting for him to leave his duties and come to the schoolroom, that Ren found his arithmetic dull, that Ran had done his sums for him when Gou’s back was turned. He had hardly time for a startled breath before two small pairs of arms wound about his waist and two nearly-identical faces nuzzled into his tunic. He caught them both a fierce embrace, straining to them to his heart and pressing his lips first to Ran’s silky head, and then to Ren’s tousled locks which so resembled his own. He thought for an instant that something seemed strangely missing from the embrace, but paid the thought no mind as he brought the twins closer.

“Where have you been all day?” came Ran’s reproving tones, lifting up her little face for a kiss.

“It was dreadfully lonely without you,” pouted Ren, casting a guilty look at the slate lying abandoned on his desk. Makoto caught the glance and clucked his tongue, setting his hands on the children’s shoulders and turning them gently back into the schoolroom.

“I know,” he said, setting the pies down at Gou’s table, “I’m sorry, Ren. But the four of us were busy preparing for the visit from Iwatobi. Gou was there with us until your lessons began.”

“You might have asked  _ us  _ to do something,” said Ren insistently, putting two tarts into his mouth at once.

“I do not believe so,” said the elder brother, looking on in amusement as Ran followed suit. “After all, if you find your lessons so dull that Ran does them for you, perhaps you would be better suited turning your attention to Lady Gou’s studies instead.”

The twins gasped at this, Ran turning to Gou with a wicked glint in her eyes and Ren looking beseechingly up at Makoto, plucking at his brother’s trailing sleeves in supplication.

“No, no! I’ll do my sums from now on—I will! Don’t set me to learn Gou’s lessons!”

Gou snorted, and Ran leapt at her governess, begging for a single glimpse of the heavy texts the elder girl studied late into the night, long after the young princess had been sent to bed.

“Ran,” said Makoto, suddenly recalling Seijurou’s words to the queen earlier that day. “Why did you not wish to help with the choosing of the betrothal ring for the prince of Iwatobi?”

Her expression darkened, and Makoto’s brows flew upward in astonishment. He had never seen such a look upon Ran’s sweet face in all his days.

“I didn’t want him to wear a ring of mine,” she muttered, wringing the hem of her tunic between her fingers. “And I don’t wish to wear one of his.”

Gou and Makoto cast each other confused glances. Reading his worry in the sudden tenseness of his back, Gou led Ren back to his desk on the far side of the room and put a rather complicated-looking sum on the slate before him, as well as another tart or two to hold his attention. Makoto led Ran into his own parlor, which opened into the schoolroom through a side door. Ran drew in a trembling breath and sat down upon one of the many footstools scattered here and there, while Makoto stood beside the door, looking as stricken as if she had dealt him a blow herself.

“Are you—are you afraid of wedding the prince, Ran?” He wondered how he could have overlooked this truth—one which ought to have called him to attention the moment his parents had settled the matter.

“Mother said I needn’t worry,” whispered Ran, kicking at the velvet carpet. “Not until I was grown. But—but I don’t want to marry him,  _ onii-chan _ .”

Makoto sighed. When the desperate appeal from Iwatobi had arrived early the previous week, he and his father had hardly considered the question of payment, nor the fact that the southern sultanate likely had nothing to give. It was the queen who had proposed the solution of a betrothal—after all, there were no princesses in the neighboring kingdoms close to Makoto’s age, nor to Ren’s, and the fact that Haruka of Iwatobi was nineteen years old and unwed had been a boon that fully made up for the loss of water and foodstuffs that the alliance would cost.

The three royal siblings had never expected to evade a betrothal. Far from it, in fact: when Makoto had reached his tenth year and not a single princess had been born in nearby lands for the previous fifteen, his parents had reconciled himself to the unfortunate truth that their elder son would marry late, most likely to a woman far younger than he.

In the eyes of the surrounding lands, the twins’ birth had been a timely blessing. Hardly a fortnight after the announcement that Atar Qasr had received a new prince and princess, the first wedding proposals had arrived at the palace for Ran. But the idea of promising their daughter to a man twenty years her senior had never occurred to the king and queen, and by and by the thought of the matter fell away, to be replaced by the more pressing matters of drought and wandering rogues that set upon trading caravans, of educating the princes and princess and training the eldest of the three for his future place upon the throne.

Eventually, the kings and princes of foreign places had relented, taking noblewomen from their own kingdoms for brides rather than seeking to strengthen their borders by marrying into another royal house. Natsuko had never considered such a thing for her own children. She sought the best for them—namely, a husband or wife of equal standing, one whose thoughts and wishes would not stand contrary to those of the heirs to the crown of Qasr. No such person had been found for Makoto, and so hardly an hour after the Iwatobian emissary collapsed at the gates, half-dead with weariness, the queen knew she had been given what she desired for her daughter…and that she would not be denied her request.

It was rather a travesty, then, that the princess wanted nothing less.

“Why?” asked Makoto, taking his sister’s small hands in his own.

“What if…what if I were to love someone? And—and have to let him alone because I’m to be married to Prince Haruka?”

“Well, you are young yet,” mused Makoto. “And I do not doubt you will grow fond of him, Ran. His uncle and father are good men, and surely they must have raised their sons to be the same. Do you fear he will be unkind to you? If he were ever to be, we should take you away from him and never let him by you again. We shall watch him most closely, Ran, until you are grown, and so will you. Qasr might need this marriage, but we would never let you wed a man who would not treat you with all the respect you are owed.”

“I never thought you would let me be married to a cruel man, not for a minute!” cried Ran. “I don’t fear for myself, only…only that I shall be kept from the one I was truly meant to find. And—and wouldn’t he miss me, too?”

Makoto narrowed his eyes. Ran’s thoughts, though haltingly spoken, rang of a fear that wrung at his heart—a terror keenly and harshly borne, so strangely clear for such a young girl.

“Mother and Father met not long before they were married, and surely you can see how much they adore each other. Perhaps Prince Haruka might prove to be this one, then?” he asked kindly, drawing the tarts he had kept for himself from his pocket and giving them to her.

“No!” she exclaimed, suddenly possessed with a feverish urgency—desiring to make her meaning plain to her brother, and yet unwilling to speak of what troubled her. “Never that,  _ onii-chan _ —never.”

“But you do not even know him,” persisted Makoto.

“I  _ needn’t  _ to know I’ll never love him,” said Ran stubbornly, dropping her gaze to her little boots again.

“What might I do to help, Ran?” he asked beseechingly, torn at the sight of his sister bearing a wound that he could not soothe with loving words, nor bandage with linen-bindings and a kiss. He hugged her close to him, wishing with all his might that the thrice-accursed drought had never come.

“Let me and Ren finish lessons early!” she chirped, pressing her cheek to his and squirming happily in his arms at the thought of leaving her books behind. “Hayato’s been let off from his for the week, so the three of us can go out to play!”

Makoto blinked, suddenly aware of what—or rather,  _ who _ —had been missing from the schoolroom. It was little Hayato Shigino, the younger son of the sultan’s advisor. He had been born a year after the twins, and was brought into the royal nursery for their companion when he was scarcely a month old. Hayato’s elder brother Kisumi was Makoto’s own age, and had been brought up alongside Makoto, Nagisa, Rin, Sei, and Gou until he was eighteen, when Lord Shigino had sent Kisumi away to Sikandar to finish his studies at a monastery.

The crown prince sighed, a refusal lingering upon his lips—after all, what with the goings-on of late, Ren and Ran had hardly paid any mind to their lessons at all—but perhaps an afternoon in the sun or in the bathing-pools would do his sister a world of good. He gave his permission with a smile, feeling a pang of loss when she tore herself from his arms and hurtled back into the schoolroom, dragging Ren from his chair and fleeing down the hall to the stairway that led out to the grounds. Makoto shook himself and went to give his apologies to the startled Gou, who stood stock-still at the front of the room with a bit of chalk in her hand, her lips parted mid-utterance.

“I thought that going out to play might help ease her mind,” he said sheepishly, stooping to gather up the overturned papers that Ren had scattered over the floor.

“You spoil them, Makoto,” laughed Gou, clucking her tongue at the hapless prince.

“I know,” he said, looking at the door with a fond smile. “But there were another two hours left. Seijurou has finished his duties as well, so—”

Gou sent him a grateful look and departed at once, leaving half her things behind in her eagerness to reach the outer hall. Makoto followed a slower pace, for all the running about he had done over the past two hours had tired him greatly.

He wandered absently to the gardens, sitting beside the lily pond for a time and watching Hayato and the twins play chase between the flowerbeds, kicking up the pebbles on the path before being driven from the place by the hassled gardener, who then spent the next twenty minutes shoveling the gravel neatly back into place. Makoto slipped off his long robe and picked up a shovel, brushing away the gardener’s protests and tidying the borders of the path beside him. He lifted his head slightly at the muffled sound of splashing that carried from the east; it appeared that the three children had found their way to the bathing pools.

“Thank you, my lord,” said the gardener, righting one of the sand-colored cobbles that lined the tulip beds. “I do not wish to trouble you—but I am most grateful, my prince.”

“The damage was not of your doing,” laughed Makoto. “It was I who let them leave their studies before they were worn out, and I who ought to see that they do no harm to your flowers.”

“I thank you, my lord,” replied the other.

Having satisfied that the garden was again as before, Makoto put his robe over his arm and found his way back to his own chambers, intent on retiring early for the evening. He laid out his sleeping garments upon the bed and rummaged through his clothes chest for a drying cloth before padding to the washroom and lighting the brazier below the basin under the pump in the corner. The prince pulled thrice at the handle, filling the basin to the brim. Bluebell-colored flames danced at the base of the copper vessel, promising that the water would boil before long. He went to the long tub on the right side of the room (to his eternal embarrassment, one properly suited to his height had to be specially made for him five years previously) and filled it half-way with cool water as he waited.

Unlike his father, Makoto did not have a manservant. The question of finding one had of course been spoken of, but none of his friends were suited for the position. Kisumi was too highly ranked for such a duty; Rin, as the son of the sultan’s previous advisor, had been trained from birth to fill the same post beside Makoto one day. Seijurou’s father was a soldier, and the lad himself had joined the army at sixteen. Nagisa’s parents had wished him to take the post, but the boy was thoroughly enamored with the study of dance by the tender age of ten, and there was nothing for it but to apprentice him to the palace entertainers.

The king and queen found it unseemly, but Makoto thought it better so. He quailed at even the thought of the others putting his chambers to rights or collecting his robes for washing, and managed as best he could with the meager aid of the palace servants.

An ominous-sounding hiss rose from the basin in the corner, and Makoto hefted it by its wooden handle and poured the steaming water into the cool, watching the contents of the tub roil for a moment before they calmed. The prince put out the brazier, hung up his garments on the hook beside the door, and sank chest-deep into the water with a sigh. A moment later, he realized yet again that he had forgotten the rose extracts he liked to bathe with, but decided there was nothing for it—after all, Hayato and the twins had likely made off with them before their own baths that morning. He reached for the sweet honey-comb soap that sat on a dish beside him, lathering himself from shoulders to toes in an effort to rid himself of the day’s sweat, gained by running up and down between the first and third levels all through the afternoon.

The fragrance of the bath, faint though it was, met Makoto’s nose as softly as the warm, homelike smell of the kitchens, soothing his back and clearing his head like the very air of spring. It took hardly a minute for the prince to sink into sleep, his head resting at the wide lip at the rim of the tub. His sheer height kept him from slipping beneath the water and drowning; the soles of his long feet were pressed to the far side of the tub, forcing him upright.

The sun began to sink in the sky, but Makoto did not wake. It was close to an hour later that he opened his eyes, uncertain what had roused him. A moment later, the sound echoed through his chambers again—the unmistakable  _ thud  _ of a rather excitable dancer pounding at the door to his quarters.

“ _ Mako-chan! Mako-chan!  _ Are you asleep? All of us are here, and Rin’s forgotten the spare key to let us in. Come open the door, Mako-chan! It’s far too early in the evening to be abed—it isn’t even dark!”

“ _ Nagisa, _ ” came Rin’s unmistakable growl. “I did not  _ forget  _ the spare key. You took it for a game of hunt-the-thimble before we left my rooms.”

“Oh, so I did,” Nagisa answered carelessly.

Makoto heard Gou yawning as she spoke. “Leave off, Nagisa. He needs his rest, and I’d wager that Sei and Rin do, too.”

The prince bounded out of the water and dried himself hurriedly, calling out, “Wait, Nagisa! I was in the bath—let me dress, and I’ll let you in.” He donned his nightshirt and trousers and ran out into the front room, swinging open the door and admitting the other four into the parlor.

Seijurou and Rin were clad in loose shirts and breeches—it appeared that Nagisa had pried them from their beds before going up to Makoto’s rooms. Inexplicably, the dancer wore what appeared to be one of Gou’s nightgowns, frothing with tucks and ruffles and narrow lines of lace at the neck and sleeves. Gou herself was dressed in a plainer sleeping gown, and shuffled forward to Makoto’s bed as soon as she was fairly across the threshold.

“What are you all doing here?” asked Makoto, warily eyeing the heavy silver tray that lay flat across Nagisa’s palms, crowded with small bowls of delicacies and succulent-looking sweetmeats in white, pink, and green. He turned his gaze to his advisor, who held a little knapsack. Rin rolled his eyes and emptied out the contents over the eiderdown—five goblets. Makoto looked at Seijurou in question.

The taller man sighed in resignation and indicated the pitcher he had set down upon the nightstand.

“Spiced orange,” said the general, taking one of the goblets from Rin and pouring himself a cupful. “Nagisa thought that our labors today warrant a bit of a celebration.”

“Well, they  _ do _ ,” insisted Nagisa, ridding himself of his bedroom slippers and clambering up onto the bed beside Gou. “I’ve been dancing with the rest of the troop since dawn. But I begged the best sweets from the kitchen, and I asked for  _ all  _ of your favorites. There’s even milk pudding for you, Rin-chan.”

Rin heaved a theatrical sigh and took the proffered bowl, emptying it in a single mouthful.

“If you’ve dragged me from my bed for a ‘midnight feast,’ you ought to have brought more,” he said, turning back to the tray. Nagisa laughed and spooned another helping of pudding into Rin’s dish before looking eagerly at the other three.

“I’ll have some cashew-nut ones,” Sei decided, receiving the little pile of sweetmeats with a grin of thanks. “And you, Gou?”

The young woman pointed wordlessly at a stack of almond rolls flavored with violet and rose, smiling sleepily as her husband procured a double handful. Nagisa claimed a dish of apples fried in butter and sugar and handed Makoto a plate of his own preferred sweet—candied peaches and apricots. The prince took them gratefully, putting an apricot into his mouth and closing his eyes as the heavenly taste flowed over his tongue like wine. At once, he felt the last of his exhaustion leave him; a quick glance in Gou’s direction proved that Rin and the Mikoshibas looked similarly revitalized, as if by a drink of brandy. Nagisa loosed a shout of glee and tumbled to the floor, flying to the foot of the bed to tug at Makoto’s hand.

“What is it, then?” asked the prince, feeling the cares of the day lift from his shoulders at the touch.

“They’re arriving five days from now,” crowed the lad, shrieking in delight as Makoto yielded to his unspoken plea and swung him about the room, cautiously keeping away from the furniture. “Think of it! A foreign prince, Mako-chan! What will he be like?”

“Well, now, I have not met him,” came the amused tones of the elder boy. “From what my father told me, Hiromasa and Kaguya visited twenty years ago with their son when I was a tot, but of course I don’t recall meeting them.”

Nagisa wriggled free of Makoto’s grasp and vaulted onto Seijurou’s stomach. The winded general was knocked onto his back, where he lay blinking up at the velvet canopy like a stunned owl.

“Was Prince Haruka there, Mako-chan?”

“Nay,” Makoto shook his head. “It was some months before he was born, so Tamotsu and Kazumi did not make the trip. Haruka is but a year elder to you.”

The dancer’s voice reached such a pitch that Rin winced, and the breath was forced from Makoto’s lungs as Nagisa threw himself forward and wrapped his arms about his shoulders.

“ _ Truly?  _ Oh, I cannot wait for them to arrive! He must be better fun than  _ you _ stuffy men, if he’s only nineteen!”

“I’ll show you the meaning of  _ stuffy,  _ you  _ midget _ —” Rin launched himself across the coverlet and caught Nagisa by the ankle, drawing him backward with an inexorable grip and opening his mouth to reveal a double row of pointed teeth. The dancer’s fingers struggled to make purchase on the heavy counterpane as he turned desperate eyes to Makoto.

“ _ Mako- _ chan!” he wailed, kicking in vain at Rin’s steady hands, “Rin’s going to  _ bite  _ me!”

Makoto settled back against the footboard, laughing unashamedly as Rin yanked the twitching foot upward. Nagisa fell onto his stomach—again atop Seijurou, who hit Rin over the head with his empty bowl.

“Horse about somewhere else,” he groaned, drawing Gou close to his side and burrowing into one of Makoto’s feather pillows. Rin’s eyes narrowed at the sight, and he answered the blow with one of his own.

Sei sat stock-still for a moment before rolling over and pouncing atop his brother-in-law, forcing the younger man’s shoulders back onto the bolster. “Have at you,  _ advisor! _ ”

“Well done, Sei-chan!” said Nagisa, having bounced away to safety—namely, he had nestled close by Makoto’s side and put his head in the prince’s lap. “Disarm him while he’s down!”

Gou, having had enough of the wrestling, delivered a hefty shove to her husband’s side and knocked Seijurou and Rin to the floor. “Not by  _ my  _ leave, Nagisa.”

After the platter of sweets had been emptied and the pitcher of orange cordial drained, Nagisa and Rin snatched up a pair of pillows and set upon Sei and Makoto, who made for the linen closet in the corner in search of weapons of their own. For a good quarter of an hour, feathers flew this way and that as the four lads battered at each other, neither pair willing to give an inch. Gou had fallen asleep long ago, curled beneath a down quilt that Seijurou had found for her.

At long last, Makoto announced that he could not raise his arms for another blow, and Seijurou was quick to follow, yielding the victory to the younger two. He and Rin clambered back onto the bed and sank into slumber, sprawled carelessly on either side of Gou. Makoto stretched himself by the carved footboard, hardly stirring when Nagisa settled his curly head upon his crossed ankles and wound his arms about the prince’s shins. Neither did any of the five move a muscle when the door to the outer room swung open some hours later, admitting two little figures with their hair and garments tousled by sleep. Ran and Ren crept softly to the bed and crawled up to their brother’s side, laying their heads upon his chest and returning to byelow without a murmur.

The seven sleepers dreamt varying dreams. Some were rather odd, such Nagisa’s visions of dancing birds in children’s smocks—or thrilling, like Ren’s thoughts of chasing bandits through the dunes. One or two were bittersweet, namely Seijurou’s dim recollections of weeping at the wedding of a beautiful maiden with flame-coloured hair and up-tilted amber eyes, and Makoto’s hopes for his own sister’s marriage. Ran’s dreams were of an unfamiliar boy in turquoise robes, sliding a silver ring  _ off  _ her finger and making her a solemn vow in tones that held nothing but kindness. Gou dreamt of a heavy gown and a golden seal, of her mother’s beloved face beaming with pride, and a large study filled with wonderful books, lining the walls from ceiling to floor. Rin was thinking of breakfast.

But all the dreams were pleasant ones, and when one of the housemaids stole in after the wee hours of the morning to tidy the sitting room, her own eyes softened at the sight of the bed in the sleeping chamber, the slumbering faces sweet with smiles of contentment.

Makoto awoke long not after dawn, with a twin tucked beneath each arm and Nagisa lying peacefully across his knees. He looked down, keenly aware of several pairs of feet pressing his legs to the coverlet, and gave up his half-hearted thoughts of rising to begin the day. He let his hands fall gently to the children’s heads, his roughened fingers combing through tumbled black locks and deep-brown hair that stood up on end. Ren sighed in his sleep and buried his face in Makoto’s tunic, breathing deeply against the finely woven cotton.

It was this moment, with the little ones held against him and their even breathing upon his neck, that recalled him to the last few words of his father’s letter to Iwatobi.

_ Should the throne receive an heir from either of my sons in future, we shall have no objection to Princess Ran dwelling in Iwatobi with your nephew after the marriage. _

He tightened his grasp about his sister’s shoulders and tried in vain to swallow the lump that rose in his throat. It was the way of things, he told himself—a woman departed her father’s house for her husband’s, as his own mother had done—but his mother had journeyed from Martulah, only over the hills that parted forest from desert, while Ran would leave for a kingdom nearly a fortnight’s hard ride off, and dwell where he could not follow her, where Ren and Hayato could not be beside her through her days.

Makoto closed his eyes and mulled over the audience that he had had with his father two days previously.  _ You are one-and-twenty, Makoto. The time for you to choose a wife is nigh. Now that Ran is assured a prince for a husband, your mother will perhaps be reconciled should we not wed you to a princess, and you may marry within these next five years. Search among the ladies of the court, my son…there is sure to be one who will make a proper queen some day. _

His heart sank further at the thought of his father’s words. Should he wed, a child would certainly follow—and ensure that Ran be taken from him forever, sent to a foreign land with not a soul to accompany her. The tears brimmed in his eyes at that, and he pressed his lips to the little girl’s hair with a poorly muffled sob. All at once, he knew it mattered not that the royals of Iwatobi would surely treasure his sister like the jewel she was—only that  _ he  _ would lose her, forced to look upon a single shadow trotting by his side when there ought to have been two. Makoto slid his arms from beneath the twins and put his face in his hands, crying quietly into his fingers.

“Makoto?”

He looked up to see the last vestiges of sleep fleeing from Seijurou’s eyes as the general’s sharp gaze lit upon the tears dripping slowly onto Ren’s head. Sei jumped off the bed and went to sit beside the prince, putting a hand upon his shoulder.

“Makoto? What is troubling you?”

“Ran,” sobbed Makoto, crumpling into his friend’s hold and weeping into his nightshirt. “Father—told me it was time for me to marry—but Ran is to go to Iwatobi the moment the kingdom receives an heir, and Sei—I cannot lose her, Sei—I  _ can’t _ —”

Seijurou’s body tensed at his liege’s words, for he too had a younger sister, one whom he treasured dearly. He nearly choked at the thought of his beloved Sakura being compelled to marry a man she did not love and then leaving the citadel…and then he realized that for the prince, this was no mere dread, but a sinister promise lurking before the cherished child that he too worshipped like a brother. He cast a troubled glance at Ran and Ren, who lay at the foot of the bed with smiles upon their lips, and ground his teeth at the very existence of one Haruka Nanase of Iwatobi.

“Then don’t.”

Makoto raised his head. “How?”

“You cannot evade a betrothal for long,” said the General grudgingly, putting his chin in his hands. “If it were me, I would have done it—but you are the crown prince, and the responsibility of continuing the royal line falls to you. But perhaps—perhaps you can wed a woman who is barren? Then you would have fulfilled your duty to your parents, and Ran’s child would be the first among the three of you. I doubt your parents would let her go after that.”

“Nay, I could not marry a barren woman,” said the disappointed prince, cursing under his breath when no plan came to him in place of Sei’s. “How could I know such a thing about a lady until after I had married her?”

“There is that,” agreed Seijurou, rubbing at his nose thoughtfully. “Ah! Perhaps you can wed a man instead!”

“I would never be permitted to do so,” said Makoto mildly, calmer now that they were beginning to think.

“There’s that, too,” sighed the other, climbing back onto the bed and slumping where he sat.

“Perhaps I can convince Prince Haruka to remain here,” answered Makoto, the makings of an idea piecing themselves together in his mind. “Perhaps—listen, Sei—we can befriend him, and help him to love Qasr as a home—so that even if I marry, he shall not  _ wish  _ to take Ran back to Iwatobi with him. Six years will surely be enough, Sei! If he grows to love our kingdom as his own, he will be content enough to remain here!”

“ _ That  _ would do it!” cried the general, bringing his fist down upon Rin’s foot. The advisor opened his eyes, sent his brother-in-law a long-suffering look, and fell asleep again, seemingly having missed that the two older men were conversing quietly across from him. “When the others wake, we shall tell them that we are  _ all  _ to be kind to the prince—that we accept him as our own and show no coldness towards him at all.”

A sudden sting of guilt made itself known in Makoto’s breast. “But…would it not be unjust to him? To befriend him only for Ran’s sake, with no thought of his own wishes?”

“Well, he’s likely to be a perfectly pleasant person,” said his friend. “If he is, of course we shall be friends—and if he  _ isn’t _ , he deserves to be deceived.”

“Nay, there is no question of that,” Makoto shook his head. “I would never let Ran wed an unpleasant man, and neither would Mother and Father.”

“There’s that settled then,” yawned Seijurou, crawling back to his place beside Gou and rolling himself in the blankets. “In the morning, we’ll…tell the rest…to be kind to him…”

He was asleep before he had finished the sentence.

Makoto drew the covers over the twins and essayed to straighten Nagisa’s limbs as best he could, tucking a pillow under the dancer’s head and tugging him away from the General’s feet. Nagisa did not wake, not even when Ren turned in his sleep and grasped at the folds of the boy’s gown. The prince felt his heart lift at the sight and turned away, crossing the cold floors to the balcony at the right wall of his room. He lifted the latch and stepped out onto it, letting the silken curtains fall shut behind him. The sky was awash with pink and golden clouds, and the roofs below seemed to shimmer in the early morning light. The palace still slept; the windows of the kitchens were dark against the shining sandstone of the walls, and not even the chickens were stirring in their coops. Makoto rubbed at his eyes and looked to the west, where the kingdom of Iwatobi lay.

How strange it all was. He had decided to part Prince Haruka from his kingdom so that he himself might never be parted from Ran—and a hundred leagues past the dunes on the horizon, still lingering in darkness, slept the future bridegroom…likely in as much of a state as Ran herself, unaware of the alterations he had already brought to the royal family of Qasr.

The needling guilt made itself known once more, and Makoto set his jaw.

“Haruka,” he said, his gaze resting upon the dunes as if it could reach the one for whom his words were meant. “I will make sure of your happiness while you are here. I will stand by you as a brother-in-law and as a friend, and see that you want for nothing…and I ask for but one thing in return. Do not take Ran from Qasr, unless—unless it be by her will, and you cannot bring yourself to remain.  _ Please. _ ”

Having spoken, he found the weight lifted from his shoulders. He raised the curtain, intending to make his bed in the schoolroom until the twins awoke for their lessons—

A sudden wind rushed upon the balcony, sweeping back the hair from his brow and brushing his cheek-bones as gently as a kiss. It was gone as quickly as it had come, wafting toward the east, but its touch had given him a flickering of hope…as if the very breeze had uttered the words,

_ Be at rest. Where but Qasr could be home to me? _

 


	3. Arrival

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Haru comes to Qasr and a manservant meets a dancer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ages (just in case anyone has trouble keeping track):
> 
> Seijurou: 22  
> Makoto: 21  
> Rin: 20  
> Haru, Rei: 19  
> Nagisa, Sakura, Gou: 18  
> Momotarou: 16

Rei stood in the princes’ chambers, casting his sharp eyes about the room. Their trunks had been taken down the previous evening, but the manservant would not put it past his master to neglect packing various small matters—unnecessary to a traveler, but invaluable to a prince. The chest-of-drawers was nearly empty; Haru’s less-formal tunics and breeches had all been laid away in lavender sachets, and the jewels placed in a locked case and tucked into Rei’s own bags—nobody trusted Haru to keep them safe, least of all Rei.

He let out a heavy breath at the sight of the bed to his right, which was neatly made, no accustomed goblet of water perched upon the nightstand. The little jars of ground azurite and gilding-paint (along with several other colors that Haru used less often) had been sealed away and put in a separate pack, and the top of the dressing-table looked achingly bare without them.

Perhaps the worst was the empty nail upon the wall, where an old portrait of the three of them had hung until the night before. Haru had painted it for Akihiro’s twentieth birthday, and it had not stirred from its place by Aki’s bed for the past three years. Aki had given it back to Haru, whose sidelong glances over the past days made it plain enough that he wished to take it with him. Rei wondered if Haru could hope to know what surrendering the painting had cost Aki…but Haru had always been thoughtless, blind to how sorely their impending departure had wounded his cousin.

Aki’s cupboard, ajar as usual, stood half-empty in the opposite corner—the crown prince having given the best of his gowns to the younger lad. As Rei shook his head and went to close it, a choked voice spoke from the doorway.

“Don’t, Rei. Let that—let that remain as it is, at least.” Rei started and turned on his heel to see Akihiro standing at the threshold, dressed in an unadorned white robe. His skin—darker than the others’ though it was—stood pallid against the translucent silk, and his sooty brows cut across his forehead like a pair of frightened caterpillars. The elder prince was pale to the very tips of his fingers, and he joined Rei as he searched the room for any small thing Haru might have left behind.

“Look after him,” said Aki, wringing his trembling hands as he turned away sharply from Rei’s doorway—the room within was utterly empty, and the prince found that looking upon it was more than he could bear. Rei set his hands on Aki’s shoulders and looked into his eyes, determined violet orbs meeting stricken blue.

“ _ Always _ ,” he promised, wrapping his arms about his friend and allowing the tousled black head to fall onto his neck. He felt his collar grow damp at once, but said nothing. Aki’s body was as still as marble but for the trembling of his hands, and the tears poured silently from his eyes.

“We will be home soon enough,” murmured Rei soothingly, patting the prince on the back and noting with some alarm that the well-built body seemed oddly shrunken to his touch.

“Can you ever forgive me, Rei?”

Rei took a step back, grasping Aki by the forearms and drawing up the drooping chin so that their eyes met once more. “What  _ for,  _ Aki? You and Haru have never been anything but good to me, and I love the both of you dearly. You must know it as well as I do.”

“We have worried you too much,” whispered the prince, looking down at his hands. “We disobeyed you when we ought to have listened instead—drove you nearly mad with fretting for our sakes. I am sorry, Rei. I will never do so again.”

Rei’s heart swelled, and he threw his arms about the prince again, trying in vain to quell the tremor of his own throat. “I would have chosen to look after the both of you if you were fifty times as troublesome. There is nothing to forgive. There never has been—and I will miss you terribly, Aki, and count the days until I am back in Iwatobi again.”

Though neither knew wherefore nor how, both began to weep, clutching at one another as if to life itself. They had not quite finished sobbing on each other’s shoulders when a shadow fell across the room again; Rei and Aki looked up to see the bemused Haru closing the door behind him, eyes widening in alarm as he saw the tears upon the others’ cheeks.

“What is the matter?” The level tones had risen to almost a shout, and he crossed the room in a bound and caught desperately at his cousin. “Why are you crying, Aki? What has happened?” His brows flew upward in panic as Rei’s voice broke before he could reply, and Haru put an arm about each quivering form.

“We will be back soon,” said Haru, wiping Aki’s face and then Rei’s with the ends of his sash. “I will come home, and everything will be as before.”

Aki choked a laugh and embraced him, straining Haru to his heart until his knuckles were white and Haru was wriggling in his grasp.

“All right, then,” said Aki, clapping the younger two upon the back. “You two have a caravan to board, and I have a procession to speed on its way. Let us go down.”

The half-hour that followed was a merciful blurring of farewells, both tearful and cheery. Lord Aichirou had bowed and said that he hoped Haru found as much happiness in his marriage as Ai had in his own. Unhappy with the betrothal though he was, Haru found that his heart had lifted at the noble’s words, and shook hands with the silver-haired man and his dainty-looking wife. Kazumi and Kaguya had cried even more than Aki did, squeezing Haru so tightly between them that he could scarcely breathe. Hiromasa and Tamotsu had hugged him and then Rei, telling the manservant to look after his master and Haru to mind all the younger lad said.

And before Haru had realized it, he and Rei had taken their places upon one of the camels near the middle of the caravan, surrounded by a scattering of royal guards. Hiromasa bid them farewell—the head-man let out a warbling cry—and the camels rose to their feet, making toward the east with a rolling gait like the rocking of the sea. Before long, the palace was lost in the distance, and one of the traveling merchants announced that they would be reaching the Iwatobian border by nightfall.

They crossed the border at sunset, whereupon they stopped to dine on preserves and a pair of desert snakes roasted over a bed of smoldering coals. Rei did not like them, for their flavor was rather bland, but Haru was fond of them, and polished off half of Rei’s share as well as his own. Recalling the scene he had happened upon that morning, he passed Rei his portion of pickled pork and gazed unblinkingly at him until the lad picked up his spoon and finished it off.

The caravan set up camp beneath the stars, not long after the camels had been relieved of their burdens so they could kneel to the ground and sleep. They sat about the townsfolk and the traveling guards like the very dunes themselves, and Haru found himself glancing at them now and again in the firelight, half-unsure whether he looked upon sand or hide. He and Rei put up their tent some yards away from their own camel. Once Rei fixed the last bough into place, Haru dropped to his knees and crawled inside, making up a bed for them from the great swathes of cloth that wrapped about the camel’s backs while they traveled. Rei spread their own linens over the floor-cloth and put the pillows against the left wall. Haru took his place at the back, while Rei settled himself by the entrance to the tent and drew the thin covers up about his shoulders. They could hear laughter from the guardsmen outside, toasting bits of meat over the fires and singing love-lorn ballads into the night.

“Are you too restless to sleep?” came Rei’s drowsy voice, breaking upon Haru’s ear like a wavelet brushing the shore. Haru turned to find the manservant’s eyes—unobscured by silver spectacles—resting solemnly on his own, framed by midnight-blue hair that reminded the prince of his absent cousin.

He nodded. “It is odd, not to have Aki here.”

Rei nodded, furrowing his brow as he studied his charge. “Do you recall the bed-time story he used to tell us when we were children? The one about little Rayan and the dancer in the woods?”

Haru’s unwilling mouth turned up in a smile, and he nodded. “I do.”

“Perhaps it would do you good to hear it again.”

Meeting no refusal, Rei crossed his hands behind his head and began the tale, the misty look of by-gone days stealing across his face like the dusk across the heavens.

“Once upon a time, there lived a poor woman on the border of a wood. She was a good lady whom fortune had largely deserted, for her husband had died many years past and left her little to live on. She made her home in a little cottage with her child, a little boy whom she called Rayan. He was the light of her days, the only beautiful thing left to her, and she loved him dearly—weaving night and day so she might earn the copper coins to feed and clothe him, teaching him all she knew so that he might make a fine man of himself one day. And they were happy together, the mother and her little son, for though they were poor they had one another and could scarcely ask for more.

“But the child grew, as children must, and soon he had reached his eighth year and his mother could teach Rayan no longer. One evening when he came in from playing, she set him before her and spoke to him. ‘Rayan, my son,’ she said. ‘You can learn no more from me, and so it is time that you go to the village school for your lessons.’ Rayan was an obedient child, and he too was eager to learn all that he could. So his mother measured him for new smocks and saved up the coin for his books, and at last the night before his first day arrived.

“’Now, my son,’ she said, ‘to reach the school, you must walk a short while through the green wood, and when you are on the other side you will see the school before you.’

“The child looked at her with wide eyes, for he had never before set foot in the forest. ‘But mother, how will I find the way?’

“’It is but a short path, Rayan,’ she said. ‘You need not fear.’

“’I know,’ said the child softly, for he did not wish to disappoint his mother. ‘But you will be at your weaving, and I am afraid to go alone.’

“The mother thought and thought, and before long she had found a way to help her boy. ‘I will call your elder brother to come and take you through the woods and leave you on the other side, and he will come again to fetch you when your lessons are done.’

“’I did not know I had a brother!’ cried the child in amazement. ‘Is he grown, Mother? Is that why he does not make his home with us?’

“’No, he is not grown,’ laughed the woman. ‘But he is nearer to manhood than you are, and so he dwells in the forest. You must go to sleep, for it is late, but when you wake he will be waiting for you under the trees.’

“And the child slept, eager to see the brother whom he had never met, the lad who so bravely lived in the forest. When he awoke his mother fed him his morning meal and gave him his books, telling him that the moment he crossed into the woods, he would see his brother before him. Once he had reached the trees and the shade grew dark about him, he saw a little clearing before him, golden with the early sunlight. Just as his mother had told him, he saw a lad some nine years elder to him dancing in the glade, wound in a fine garment of scarlet silk and decked in jewels of the finest pearls and gold. His skin glowed like the very moon, and upon his brow was a glittering gem as pale as a frosty star. Rayan did not wonder that his brother had such fine things, for he thought that a boy brave enough to live in the woods wore them better than the noblest of kings.

“’I am Madhan,’ said the lad, leaping to Rayan’s side with a laugh that rang through the glen like a song. ‘Mother told me that you would be coming, and so I am here.’

“’How did she tell you?’ asked the little one, taking his brother’s hand and following him along the forest path. ‘She did not go out last night, nor in the morning.’

“’She came when you were sleeping and told me all,’ said the boy. ‘She told me that my little brother was as bold as a lion, and would look after me as I took my walks in the woods.’

“Rayan was overjoyed that his wonderful brother thought him bold, and so he set his small shoulders and did not quail at the flickering shadows in the trees, though they would have frightened him had he been alone. But all through the walk Madhan did not let go of his hand, and he told him tales of far-away lands as beautifully as if he had journeyed there himself, just so Rayan could hear of them that morning…”

Haru lay with his eyes shut, listening to Rei’s warm voice fill the tent like the steam of a bath. A small grin curved his mouth when Rei reached the end of the tale, where little Rayan discovered that Madhan was not his brother, but a kindly god who had answered his mother’s prayers to keep him safe.

Rei fell asleep hardly a moment after he finished the story, but Haru lay awake for another half-hour or so. The old tale had brought him peace, and for the first time since the morning he thought of Aki without even a touch of sorrow. The heart-rending thought of Aki marrying and leaving the shared chambers in the palace no longer frightened him, and he nearly laughed aloud at the picture of himself, some three or four years older, with Aki’s toddling children frolicking about him. One, surely, would inherit the cobalt eyes of the royal house…perhaps a tiny daughter with her mother’s mahogany hair, as blithe and beautiful as Aki and Jun at their best. The truth washed over him in Rei’s dulcet tones, easing Haru’s spirit like oil poured upon troubled waters.

_ But the child grew, as children must. _

They were children no longer, and he was the last to realize it. Rei had known it first, perhaps ever since they were nine years old and he took up his post as manservant. Aki had understood it later, likely not before he took his place by his father’s side in the court. But Haru had never stood before the council making decisions of state, nor had he stayed up night after night to nurse a pair of contrary princes back to health. This was the first duty given him—Aki and Rei had shouldered heavier ones long ago, and the time had come for him to follow…

II.

“Do I look well?” asked Haru, eyeing his reflection in the looking-glass Rei had brought on the trip.

“Well enough,” said Rei, carefully dusting away the sand from Haru’s back. “Praise be that we shall not be required to meet the sultan and queen until after we have refreshed ourselves,” he muttered, looking unhappily at the prince’s cotton gown. “But one cannot travel in ceremonial robes, so I suppose it can’t be helped.”

It had been sixteen days since their departure, and they were now camped twenty minutes’ ride from the Qasrian border—as in Iwatobi, the palace stood close by it, though it was only half an hour’s journey from border to citadel in Qasr. They had stopped to wash themselves at an oasis and change their travel-stained robes for clean ones; the trading caravan had gone ahead, while Haru, Rei, and a handful of guards remained behind. The guards had finished dressing and were idling about by the shore, soothing their cracked heels with wet sacks wrapped about them. Rei had been hard-pressed to pry Haru from the water after his bath, and at last he told the caravan to go on and the guards to fetch him out of the pool.

Rei poked his head out of the tent and called to the soldiers, and Haru was made to mount one of the larger camels and sit there alone.

“Why can’t you come up with me?” he asked petulantly, holding fast to the reins and glaring down at his unapologetic friend.

“You are a bridegroom,” said Rei calmly, ordering the guards to take down the tent and pack it atop one of the baggage-camels. “You cannot pass the gates clinging to your manservant and looking as if you would like to be sick.”

“That is all  _ you  _ know,” said Haru, making a face. Rei took pity on him and changed his camel for a slightly smaller one.

“There. Grasp the reins tightly, and don’t hesitate to pull them if the beast veers off course,” warned Rei. “But you shall not be going first, so that burden will fall to the headsman.”

Haru did as he was told, and was slightly comforted when Rei drew up beside him on his own steed. They went on in silence after that, and before long the pale walls of a shimmering city rose before them, as pale as summer clouds resting upon the sands. A minute more and they stood before the gates themselves, a pair of masterfully worked doors inlaid with lapis lazuli and mother-of-pearl. The sentries standing on either side sent up a cheer and hurried to open them, and the Iwatobian party entered the kingdom of Atar Qasr.

Haru’s first thoughts were that Qasr did not seem very different from Iwatobi; but then he looked to the ground to see the camel treading upon stubby grass and parched earth rather than golden sand, and upward at a sky rather more dotted with clouds than the skies at home. Townsfolk and children ran after them as they proceeded up the wide streets toward the palace glittering in the distance.

“The bridegroom, the bridegroom!” cried a group of little lads, doing their best to keep pace with Haru’s camel.

“My, his skin is as pale as an almond blossom,” whispered a pair of young women, their cheeks pinkening when the prince’s gaze passed over them. He flushed scarlet and turned his eyes ahead, nodding to his left and right whenever any of the passersby seemed especially keen to catch his attention. He looked back to see that Rei was following with a face that rivaled the sun in color; it appeared that the silver spectacles had made a favorable impression upon the girls flocking after the party.

Ten minutes later, they stood at the palace gates, which were opened from within. The procession entered—the gates shut behind them—and Haru had his first glimpse of the place that was to be his home for the next three moons. Golden spires glittered as far as the eye could see, and flower gardens stretched to the high walls on either side of the tiled pathway. The camels knelt at the headsman’s signal, and the two boys dismounted gracefully, sliding to the ground without so much as a stumble.

As they looked around in search of a receiving party, their eyes lit upon a trio of young men and a lady dressed in flowing white robes. They were running down the marble steps, grins upon their suntanned faces, and in the next instant they stood before them. The tallest of the men boasted a thatch of burnt-orange hair and slanting yellow eyes, while the shortest had long wine-colored locks and eyes that matched them precisely in hue, exactly like those of the lady who stood beside him—likely his sister, Haru thought. The last of the group was an inch or so taller than Rei, with a windblown visage crowned with unruly hair as brown as dusty earth, and lit by gentle eyes the color of young leaves in the spring.

Rei went forth to greet the party and bowed low before the green-eyed lad.

“Your Highness,” he said, palms pressed together, “thank you for receiving us.”

“You are most welcome,” said the lilting voice, reminding Haru at once of freshly baked date-pudding and bubbling baths sweet with rosewater. “How do you call yourself, then?”

“Rei Ryuugazaki, Highness,” said Rei, bowing once more. “Prince Haruka’s manservant.”

Haru lifted his gaze at the mention of his name and smiled at the younger boy.

“And dearest friend,” he interrupted, coming forward and inclining his head to the Qasrian prince. To his astonishment, the taller man met him with outstretched hands, which grasped his own and pressed them for an instant before letting them fall again.

“Prince Haruka,” he said, smiling so widely that his brows seemed to lift of their own accord. “We have been awaiting your arrival for weeks.”

“I am sorry that we were delayed, my lord,” said Haru. “We were traveling with a caravan, and were unable go as swiftly as we should have liked.”

“No! No, you were expected no sooner,” he assured. The young woman sent him an exasperated look, and his ears went red as he laughed at his error. “I forgot to introduce myself, did I not? My name is Makoto, first son of Natsuko and Masoto and heir to the throne of Qasr.”

“Elder brother to the Princess Ran?” asked Haru. A queer look crossed Makoto’s face and vanished before Haru could make head or tail of what it had meant.

“Yes, and to Prince Ren,” said Makoto. He motioned to the shorter man standing beside him, who bowed before Haru with a flourish.

“Lord Rin Matsuoka,” he said, “Makoto’s advisor and son of the sultan’s late head of council—and elder brother to the Lady Gou,” Rin indicated the girl at his right, who made Haru a graceful curtsy and beamed up at him, her eyes hovering over the clear-cut lines of his jaw and shoulder. Her brother sighed in resignation as Haru and Rei exchanged bewildered looks.

“Lady Gou Mikoshiba,” she said, her russet glance coming to rest upon Haru’s face. “Tutor to Prince Ren and Princess Ran, and prospective scholar of the court. And  _ this _ ,” she said, seizing the orange-haired man about the wrist, “is General Seijurou Mikoshiba, the head of the army and my much beloved husband.”

Once the general had given his greetings, Makoto led the way indoors. Servants and noblemen alike lingered in the corridors as they passed, staring at Haru as if for dear life. Every so often, Haru thought he caught glimpses of black, brown, and strawberry-golden hair flashing by, darting from alcove to alcove just out of view. After they had climbed to the third level, the lithe footsteps of the three curious shadows died away, and Makoto gestured to three doors that stood side-by-side along the corridor.

“The one on the left will be yours, Haruka,” he said. “It opens directly into my own by a door in your sitting room, and there is a separate chamber within for Rei. Do not hesitate to seek me out, should you need anything.”

Haru nodded. Makoto bowed and departed, with the other four trailing after him. An unbidden feeling of loss made itself known at once, and Haru found his lips parting for the cry almost before he had thought.

“Makoto!” he called, starting after the Qasrian nobles before Rei’s fingers closed about his arm like a vice grip.

The elder prince turned back.

“Do not—if it is no trouble to you—don’t call me Haruka,” he said, his voice dwindling to a near whisper. “Those close to me have always called me Haru—and as we are to be brothers-in-law one day, I thought—”

He dared to raise his head when a soft, startled sound broke from Makoto’s throat. Rei’s fingers loosened upon his wrist, and Lord Matsuoka and the General exchanged ominous looks, glancing anxiously to Haru and away again.

Rei stepped forward, having understood by the worry in Lord Matsuoka’s eyes that Haru had been untoward in some way or other, although for the life of him he could not say what his master had done.

Makoto left his advisor’s side and came swiftly down the corridor until he stood before Haru. Green eyes met azure for a long moment—terribly long, Rei thought. It seemed as if the Qasrian prince was searching for something in Haru’s face—something that try as he might, he did not find. Haru’s lip trembled, and he wished with all his heart that Rei had not let go of his arm.

He had begun to wonder if he ought to throw himself headlong into his chambers and shut the door behind him when a pair of hands descended gently upon his shoulders. A look of utter remorse twisted Makoto’s fine features, and he bent his head almost imperceptibly, as if pleading forgiveness for some imagined slight.

“Haru,” he said, sending poor Rei into yet another paroxysm of terror. “You and Rei ought to rest yourselves before the welcoming feast tonight. Rin slaved over the bill of fare for a whole afternoon so that it might be suited to your tastes, and it would likely wound him greatly if you were too tired to sample the dishes he has chosen.”

“ _ Oi! _ ” called Rin sharply, setting his hands on his hips. “I’ll have you know it was only because  _ you  _ left the planning to me and Seijurou went to hide in the kitchens, you traitorous prince.”

Seijurou laughed, and with that the spell was broken. He tugged playfully at his brother-in-law’s hair, snorting as the younger man squeaked in protest and tried to bat him away—only to be set upon by his sister, who sprang up onto his back and stretched his mouth into a wide grin, baring a set of pointed teeth. Rei put a hand to his mouth to hide his snickering, and Haru smiled at the sight, thinking that Aki would have liked these riotous young Qasrians.

“You remind me of home,” he laughed, recalling a day eleven years previously when Rei had filled Aki’s hair with molasses in a rare fit of mischief. “I rather think my elder cousin would like you, Lord Matsuoka.”

“There’s no need to be so formal,  _ Haru _ ,” Rin held out his hand, and Haru shook it. “Rin’s plenty good enough. After all, we shall be seeing rather a lot of each other, won’t we?” He winked, and then squirmed furiously in Seijurou’s headlock. “ _ Sei.  _ Get  _ off. _ ”

“You’ll have to call me Sei, then,” said the General. “After all, we can’t stand for our beloved guest favoring Rin over me, can we, Gou?”

“Pay no mind to the lads,” said the girl fondly. “But we are truly glad to have you among us, Haru.”

“And you, Rei!” said Mikoshiba. “You announced yourself as Haru’s manservant—but you are his keeper, are you not?”

“He is,” said Haru, as Rei shook his head. Makoto smiled at the two of them, and the last sliver of worry passed from Haru’s heart.

“Rest well, both of you, for you have a busy night ahead. The servants are at your command should you require anything for the baths.”

Rei thanked them and carried the small night-bags into their chambers. Haru followed, his eyes widening in delight at the sight that met them within. The sitting room was large, the walls covered in tapestries depicting hunts and beasts of legend. Several comfortable-looking settees stood about, and Rei made for the one beside the bookshelf at once. A pair of drawn curtains on the north wall seemed to lead to a little balcony, but Haru paid it no mind. He tried the first door on the left and entered an opulent-looking bedchamber, far more ornate than the one he shared with Aki at home. The chairs were upholstered in heavy brocade, matching the silken eiderdown upon the bed. There was a bookcase here, as well; a handsome-looking one beside the bed, boasting many of the titles that lined the walls of the palace library in Iwatobi. A heavy armoire of polished mahogany—imported from foreign parts, without doubt—stood in a corner, meaning that the door to his right was to the bathing chamber.

A great metal tub stood in the center of the room, filled with cool water. Scarlet blossoms drifted to and fro across the ripples, flowers that Haru had never laid eyes upon in Iwatobi. The furled petals gave off a sweet scent that he was all too fond of… _ roses.  _ He had grown to manhood bathing in their fragrance, but he had never known that the flowers themselves were so lovely.

He heard a stern cough behind him, and turned to see Rei shaking his head in the doorway.

“Not until you have slept,” he said firmly. Rei pulled Haru out of the washroom and pointed to the sleeping garments laid out on the bed. “We have until the evening before we must appear before the sultan and the queen, and you must be at your best.”

Haru obeyed without a murmur, donning the light tunic and trousers and sliding between the covers. They were heavier than he was accustomed to, for it was cooler in Qasr. Rei sat by him for a quarter of an hour, as if determined that his troublesome charge not be left alone by the tub until he was well and truly asleep. Haru toyed with the thought of feigning slumber, but had never been able to fool Rei for long…and he  _ was  _ weary, for the weeks of traveling through the scorching desert had taken its toll—one that cried out for sleep as well as a bath…

He awoke an hour later. Rei had gone; an investigation of the apartment proved that Rei had his own set of rooms, a bedchamber slightly smaller than Haru’s and another wash-room. The blue-haired boy lay atop the coverlets in his traveling robes, breathing deeply into the pillows. Haru crept back into his own room and went to the bathing chamber on tiptoe. 

The roses had not wilted. In fact, they seemed to have opened in his absence, as if they had been-half-shut when he first saw them earlier in the afternoon. He clambered over the side, moving carefully so as not to spill a precious drop upon the tiled floor—or wake Rei, which would be rather worse. He had not thought to remove his tunic, but neither did he wish to. After all, it was not really a bath he sought—if it were so, he would make use of the brazier beside the door and the little shelf piled with soaps and scented oils. But he desired the water, and the water alone.

Haru sank beneath the surface, blowing contented bubbles as he lay at the bottom of the tub. He heard a door open and then close, but thought nothing of it—after all, it could not be Rei, for Haru had not shut the door to the manservant’s rooms, nor to his own. He lifted his head over the rim of the tub and drew in a hurried breath before drifting down again, watching the roses bob to and fro above him. He stretched out an arm and plucked one of the blooms, drawing it down to his face. The petals were like velvet, and he closed his eyes at the touch—as fine as silk, but not nearly as cold.

He had little more than a moment to marvel over the flower before a shadow fell across him, veiling the slanting light from the small window set high upon the wall. Thinking that perhaps a cloud had crossed the sun, Haru did not stir—until a pair of arms plunged into the tub and wound about his waist, wrenching him from the water with an inexorable grip. He was too startled to struggle, and even to open his eyes—after all, Rei was rather weaker than he and Aki were, for the manservant had never attended training with the soldiers. Before he had quite understood what was happening, he felt himself set down upon the icy tile and a crushing force applied across his breastbone. At this last indignity, his eyes flew open—only to see the terror-stricken face of the Qasrian prince hanging less than an inch from his own, seemingly horrified into utter silence. Makoto’s mouth was quivering like a leaf, and at the sight of Haru’s disgruntled glare he let out a cry.

“Can you breathe, Haru?” he said, putting his fingers to Haru’s neck and measuring his pulse.

Haru lay in stubborn silence, wincing at the pain in his chest. All he had wanted was to splash about in the bath for a while without waking Rei, and he wondered rather savagely if that had been too much to wish for. As if summoned by the very thought, Rei appeared on the threshold, his grey robes crumpled from tossing and turning in his sleep. At the sight of Makoto kneeling over Haruka’s pale, still body, Rei screeched like an angry cat and flung himself across the damp floor to his master’s side.

“I  _ told  _ you to  _ go to bed _ ,” shouted Rei, pulling off his bedroom-slippers and hitting Haru over the shoulder with them. “I did  _ not  _ ask you to slip into the washroom  _ the moment my back was turned. _ ”

Makoto looked more horrorstruck than ever, if such a thing were possible.

“Has he—done this often?” whispered the prince, unconsciously taking one of Haru’s hands in his own and grasping it tightly.

Rei nodded. “I cannot count the times when he was meant to be elsewhere and I found him stretched in the bath instead. Haru, don’t look at me in that idiotic fashion. Get up at once. Did you strike your head on the floor when you fell?”

“Fell?” said Makoto, turning to the manservant. “I lifted him out.”

Rei looked at Makoto, askance. “What for?”

“What  _ for?  _ He—he was lying under the water with his eyes shut—I thought he had  _ drowned  _ himself—haven’t you the slightest care for your master? If he is bent on doing himself an injury and you know it, should you not have been  _ with  _ him?” Makoto’s voice was strained, and he looked down at Haru, who seemed to be growing more confused by the moment. “ _ Look  _ at him, Rei! I must summon the healers—he does not know where he is—” He laid a finger across Haru’s lips and nearly slumped in relief at the touch of the boy’s soft breath upon his skin. “He is breathing, at the least. Are—are you  _ laughing? _ ”

Rei had collapsed upon the wet floor, clutching at his stomach and  _ shrieking  _ with laughter. Haru sent him an irritated glance and wondered whether he would be permitted to have another bath after the feast that evening now that Rei seemed to be in a better mood.

“You thought he had  _ drowned  _ himself?” gasped Rei, regaining his composure with considerable difficulty. “No, a thousand times no! He is more accomplished than most at holding his breath, and he is rather fond of lying at the bottom of his bath.”

“Then why does he not speak?” asked Makoto, having calmed at the sight of Haru’s brows drawn up in a thunderous frown, which was rather pointedly directed at Rei.

“He is angry that you took him from the water, no doubt,” said Rei briskly, sitting up and bringing down the slipper on Haru’s head once more for good measure. “Now get up and stop frightening His Highness out of his wits, Haruka. If you don’t go and dress at once, I shan’t let you have another bath after supper. And tell him you are sorry.”

Haru stood up without a word of protest, wringing out his sodden nightshirt and casting a regretful glance at the tub. He lowered his head as he spoke to the befuddled prince, who still sat on the sopping floor with his mouth open.

“I offer you my humble apologies, Makoto. Rei spoke truly. I was in no danger, and I—I am sorry that I worried you.” He wrung his hands.

“It…was no trouble,” said Makoto weakly, watching the Iwatobian prince turn on his heel and stride into his bedchamber, rummaging about for a spare set of clothes. Rei let his head fall back against the tub and groaned

“It isn’t as hard as it seems,” he offered. “I’ve been looking after him since we were children.”

Makoto put his face in his hands and sighed.

“Your Highness,” said Rei, “when you showed us to the chambers—was it unseemly for Haru to ask that you call him by his short name?”

“Nay! Certainly not,” said Makoto. “I…I had not expected him to receive our welcome so kindly. We rather thought he might be dour with us, for the betrothal was settled only three weeks ago—and here you are.”

“He is not the kind to behave so,” replied Rei. “He consented to the marriage for the sake of both his people and yours, and is as grateful to your father for his aid as his uncle the Emperor is.”

Haru opened the door to the bathing chamber, effectively putting a halt to the exchange.

“Rei, when are we to be presented to the court?”

“In an hour,” said Rei, rising to go in search of dry robes. “I put the peacock-patterned gown in your wardrobe—put it on, and then I shall help you with the jewels. Do you require a hand up, Highness?”

Makoto shook his head and clambered to his feet. “I shall have to go and change my robes as well. I will see you in the throne room, then?” He looked toward Haru, who stood like a marble statue before the wide bay-window. Water ran from his sodden breeches to the floor, and for a moment Makoto thought he had not heard. But the Iwatobian prince turned toward him, and offered a hint of a smile.

“Yes, you will.”

Makoto excused himself and slipped out into the outer hall. As he shut the door to Haruka’s apartments behind him, he found himself face to face with Rin, whose crimson brows rose nearly to his hair at the sight of Makoto’s robes, which looked as if he had taken a bath in them.

“Did you lose your way to your own chambers?” asked Rin, too astonished to jest. “Why were you in Haru’s?”

“I went to inform his manservant that they would be called for, and…oh, it is a long story,” muttered the prince, flushing as red as Rin’s hair. “Suffice it to say that Prince Haruka is very fond of baths.”

“Well, you’ve no time for one now,” Rin pointed out. “Your mother sent me to fetch you.”

“I will take only a minute,” Makoto promised, entering his own chambers and making straight for the dressing-room in search of a suitable gown. He found the one he sought almost at once; a heavy green satin the color of his eyes, with Qasrian willows embroidered over it in gold. He stripped off his wet things and allowed Rin to lace him into his undergown, putting his feet into a pair of moss-colored slippers with buckles set with tourmalines. As Rin did up the clasps of the robe, he asked,

“What did you think of him?”

“He is pleasant enough—and yet unlike anyone I have met before,” mused Makoto, recalling how silently Haru had lain under the drifting roses. “But somehow it seems as if he is not unknown to me. When I met his eyes, my fear for Ran vanished, as if it had never been. He will treat her with all the care she is owed—of that I am sure.”

“I am glad,” said Rin, breathing out in relief. “After all, he seems a decent sort.”

Makoto smiled. “And strange, perhaps—but yes.”

III.

“Do I look well?” asked Haru for the second time that afternoon, standing before a looking-glass nearly as high as the door. Rei had laced him into the peacock gown, one that Haru had worn only twice before: once at Akihiro’s engagement party and again on the occasion of his eighteenth birthday. The stitching was masterfully done, blues and greens and violets sweeping across the aquamarine silk like a thousand eyes with orange and emerald burning at their hearts. The sleeves fell to the floor in a riotous stream of color, and the whispering train gathered by his feet like the very pools of spring. The sash matched the finest lapis in hue, and Rei drew back once he had tied it, looking at his friend with approving eyes.

“Beautiful,” said Rei. “Now, the jewels.”

Rather than buttoning about his throat, the neck of the gown curved from shoulder to shoulder, ensuring that the turquoise gems shone against pale skin rather than shimmering cloth. Once he had done up the clasp of the necklace, Rei slid a pair of matching silver cuffs twinkling with peridots alongside the turquoise onto Haru’s wrists. The simple circlet upon his brow was a plain silver band with a single blue stone at the center, the same shade as the jewels in the tinkling ear-rings. As Rei drew a little vial of kohl from his pocket, Haru lowered his eyelids and held still, his brows twitching at the cold dampness of the paint-brush. Once Rei had finished, Haru put on his signet ring and rose to his feet, moving lithely about the room in a graceful dance. The robes flowed about his legs like water, and he laughed at the image that met him in the mirror. Haru put his face to the glass and kissed his reflection, a sweet trill of mirth bubbling from his lips as he sprang away again.

Rei smiled at the sight, drawing his own robe from the trunk. It was the violet-and-silver that Aki had worn on the night of the leaving feast three weeks previously—Aki had insisted that Rei’s station warranted proper attire in Qasr. Once he had dressed and put on his own adornments, Haru dragged him from the chambers, oddly eager to rejoin the others.

“Slowly, Haru,” muttered Rei. “This is not seemly—you cannot—”

He fell silent as the door beside theirs opened and Rin stepped out, dressed from head to foot in unembroidered velvet the color of blood. He nodded appreciatively at Haru, who inclined his head in return. Before either of the Iwatobians could utter a greeting, he swung sharply to the right and disappeared down the corridor, his train fluttering behind him like a rippling flame.

As they gazed down the hall after Rin, the centre door swung to again and they turned to see the Qasrian prince standing before the threshold. An ornate gold diadem crowned his head of tousled hair, and an emerald carcanet hung about his neck. His eyelids were brushed with powdered gold, which drifted in scattered grains to his cheeks below. The light of the sconces fell upon his forehead like a kiss, winking where it struck the precious dust glinting above his brows. He looked about him—for his absent advisor, perhaps—and smiled at Haru and Rei, who stood stock-still before their own chambers as if rooted to the ground.

“You look well, Haru,” he offered, his gentle eyes speaking for him more eloquently than his speech. “And you, Rei.”

“I thank you, Highness,” Rei made a short bow, while Haru merely nodded in reply.

“Come, let us go to the throne room,” urged Makoto, striding briskly to the staircase and taking the steps two at a time. Haru and Rei followed at a slower pace, for both of them were unaccustomed to walking with a train. The sudden patter of light footsteps sounded behind them, and Haru turned to see three children in nearly identical gowns dart out of a servant’s corridor, hand-in-hand as they ran. The youngsters stopped in their tracks as they caught sight of Haru and Rei.

The only girl among them had black hair a shade or so lighter than Haru’s, and wide blue-green eyes. Haru’s mouth went dry as he took in the delicate stitching on her robe and the locket resting upon her chest—a large filigree pendant with the Qasrian willow etched across it. He felt his jaw drop, and his stomach sank as if he had swallowed an iron weight. Haru’s eyes went frantically to the boys by her side: one with reddish hair, one with brown. All of them were small and slight; the boys’ heads hardly rose past his elbows, and the girl was scarcely half an inch taller.

Rei’s face purpled despite himself as he understood exactly who the little maiden must be. Makoto, having realized that the other two were no longer following him, looked over his shoulder to see Haru standing eight paces behind as if frozen to the floor and Rei looking as if something was stuck in his throat. He glanced over their rigid shoulders and understood at once.

“ _ Onii-chan! _ ” The children pushed past the thunderstruck guests and threw their arms about Makoto, who hugged them each in turn, admiring their gowns and jewels as they pointed them out to him.

“Why isn’t Gou with you, Ren?” he said gently, tapping the dark-haired little lad on the nose. “I know she was meant to accompany you, so do not tell me otherwise.”

“She and the maids went to do up her hair for the feast,” chimed in the younger boy. “So we went on without her.”

“ _ Hayato _ ,” said Makoto fondly. “You ought to have waited for her. Never mind, she will come down once she finds the chambers empty.”

Looking up, he cleared his throat and tilted his chin at the girl.

“Haru, Rei—meet my sister, Princess Ran.”

Haru shook himself from his stupor first; Rei was still making gurgling noises of distress at his right. He went down upon one knee and bowed in the Iwatobian fashion, one hand resting loosely by his side and the other over his breast.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Princess.” The child offered him her hand, and he took it carefully in both of his own and placed a delicate kiss upon her fingers.

“And you,” she said, tugging at his wrist until he rose to his feet.

“ _ Haruka nii-chan! _ ” cried her twin brother, bouncing away from his brother’s side and grasping the silky folds of Haru’s robe in his dimpled hands. “We’ve been waiting for weeks for you to come!”

Haru felt warmth flow back into his limbs as the small boy tugged happily at his gown. “Well, I am here now,” he said. “You are Prince Ren, are you not?”

“I am,” said the child, setting his chin proudly forward. “And this is Hayato. His father helps ours with matters of the council.”

The other lad made to bow, but Haru put out a hand and stopped him.

“There is no need of that,” he said, noting that Hayato and Ran were far less pleased to greet him than Ren had been. “Your father fills an honorable place, Master Hayato. Where I come from, a king’s advisor is as good as a prince.” He failed to mention that the Iwatobian rulers were usually advised by their younger siblings, but felt little remorse at the omission when his words brought a tiny smile to Hayato’s lips.

“Thank you, Highness,” he chirped. “I will tell my father so.”

Haru shot a glance at Ran out of the corner of his eye and found to his surprise that the careful courtesy that she had drawn on like a mask was gone, replaced by the same look of childish wonder that her brother wore.

Another squeal rang through the corridor as Ren laid eyes upon Rei, whose face went white as he understood what was about to befall him. Ren jumped up and wound his arms about Rei’s neck, hanging over a foot from the floor as the manservant tried in vain to straighten his back.

“ _ Ren _ ,” said Makoto, putting out a restraining hand. “It is unkind to treat one’s guests so. Leave Rei alone.”

“You’re very beautiful, Rei-nii-chan,” said Ren seriously, yielding to his brother’s command and dropping back to the ground. “Your parents chose your name well.”

Rei went pink and brushed a hand over the little prince’s hair.

“I thank you, my lord.”

“Don’t call me in such a way!” exclaimed Ren, aghast.

“What shall I say instead, then?” asked Rei.

“Ren, of course,” said the lad promptly.

At that moment, Gou appeared on the stairs and glared at the children, tapping a slippered foot as she awaited an explanation.

“ _ Run! _ ” shrieked Hayato, losing his head completely. He flung himself toward the other end of the hall with the twins on his heels, and the three of them had disappeared down the steps to the first floor before their elders had time for anything more than a startled look.

“The children are delightful,” said Rei, laughing slightly at Makoto’s resigned expression as they continued on their way. “Aki and Haru were much the same when we were young—I was forever chasing them to their lessons and scolding them both when they crept away to carry out some mischief behind our governess’s back.”

“ _ Rei, _ ” hissed Haru, jerking his chin petulantly at his friend. “You needn’t be so eager to make a fool of me.”

Makoto smiled and shook his head at some fond remembrance. “There is nothing to be shy of, Haru. I obeyed my nurses and tutors as a child, but I was caught up in my friend’s schemes more often than I care to admit—and I hardly emerged from them smelling like a rose, either.”

“And  _ that  _ is the truth,” said Gou, nodding solemnly at the newcomers. “Ten years ago, Seijurou and Rin poured syrup over the schoolroom floor and told Lord Shigino that Makoto did it. Our mother nearly whaled the hide off their backs when our nurse told her what had happened. She didn’t lay a finger on Makoto, of course—nobody thought for a moment that he could do such a thing.”

Haru smiled faintly. “When Rei and I were nine, he put molasses in Aki’s hair and hid in the kitchens for three hours before the cook found him in a potato-basket.”

“ _ Haru _ ,” cried Rei. “A man behaves in an unseemly fashion  _ once  _ in his life and is never allowed to forget it. Strange justice, this. But do not forget the day you exchanged my lesson-books with Aki’s and let him go his tutor with my spelling primer.”

Makoto motioned to them to be silent, and Rei clapped his mouth closed, gazing up in awe at the carved doors before them—easily twice as high as their counterparts in Iwatobi and three times as intricate. Makoto knocked upon the worn square in the center of the left panel and drew back as the doors swung inward, admitting the four into the throne room.

Haru felt the breath leave his body.

The chamber he had entered could not be called a room, for it was almost a palace of its own. The ceiling was domed fully thrice, each curving bow glowing with gold leaf and lapis lazuli. Arch after arch stretched from the door to the raised dais at the other end, bearing curving mosaic portraits tiled with breathless care. The last and highest of the domes boasted a ring of oval windows, from which the deep indigo of the early evening seemed to spill like water. Tiny galleries lined the walls, each of them aglow with the cheery warmth of a thousand candles. Precious gems were set into the walls as liberally as the mortar itself, and every inch of the chamber twinkled like a net of living stars. Haru tipped back his head and drank of the sheer loveliness that surrounded him, with the gentle flashes of sapphire, ruby, and diamond in the torchlight casting blue and scarlet shadows across his cheeks. The gleam of the lanterns danced across the gold leafing, reflected again and again until the throne room burned as bright as day.

“Come,” whispered Makoto, and Haru and Rei followed blindly, trying to draw in as much of the glory about them as they could.

As they reached the other side, Haru’s eyes adjusted to the light and the faces of the sultan and his came into focus—one a large, gentle-looking man who wore spectacles almost exactly like Rei’s, and the other a slender woman with eyes as beautiful in their color as Ran’s. Haru fell to his knees before them, bowing his head as Rei followed suit.

“Your Majesties,” he said, fixing his gaze upon the shimmering floor.

“Rise, Haruka of Iwatobi.” The voice was as sweet as a waterfall in summer, and Haru looked up and met the queen’s gaze with his own.

“My, but you do look like your cousin,” she said, “He was but a child when Hiromasa brought him to Qasr, but I am sure that even now he must greatly resemble you.”

“He does, Your Majesty,” answered Haru. The queen nodded as if she was well-satisfied with his reply, and then she spoke again.

“Come here to me, my prince.”

Haru’s heart jumped into his throat. He made his way to her throne with faltering steps, and made to kneel before her again when a soft hand beneath his chin caught him in his tracks. Unsure what she sought, he stood as if he were made of stone, not daring to move a muscle as her silken touch slipped from his face to his wrists, drawing his own two hands into her lap as she bent to look at the palms. Her fingers ran over the calluses upon each of his, and she studied each one as if it were a lesson she was determined to learn. The queen’s nails—stained the deep, rosy color of lotus buds—grazed the sprinkling of scars that raised the roughened skin, scars gained by six years of training alongside the soldiers.

“Broken,” said the queen, touching the line that curved about the flesh beneath his thumb. “As it has not been before.”

Haru opened his mouth, but she shook her head at him and resumed her study of his hands.

“Broad and deep.” She spoke again, tracing the one that ran below his fingers. “Quiet, but strong.” The queen lifted his right hand and looked at the notch that ran below his smallest finger. “Once and no more,” she whispered to herself, looking down to the steps where her younger children sat atop a pair of comfortable cushions. Then she drew his hand close to her eyes, smiling at the line that began below his middle finger and plunged sharply across to his wrist. “The cherished twain, and thrice for luck.”

She released him and looked approvingly into his face. “You have a fine hand, my son.”

“Thank you,” said Haru lamely, rather unsure what the queen had found in her study excepting the clear fact that he had trained in combat. “But I am sure your hand is the finer.”

“Perhaps my wife will permit me to speak now,” grumbled the sultan good-naturedly. Haru hardly held back a wince as the man took his hands, but he relinquished them after he had spoken. “You are most welcome, lad. We have been most anxious for your arrival.”

“You rule over a beautiful kingdom, my lord,” answered Haru, thanking his stars that he had been paying attention when Rei taught him the correct reply.

Masoto nodded, well-pleased with the prince’s answer.

“From this day henceforth, I claim you as my son, and my duty to you as no less than to the children of my own flesh,” he said earnestly. “While you will not be wed into my house for some years yet, there will be a day when I pass my dearest treasure into your keeping. Not even my kingdom, but my most beloved daughter. Do you swear that you will keep her from harm for the rest of your days, and treat my Ran like the precious jewel she is?”

“I will treasure her to the end of my days,” said Haru, overwhelming even himself with the solemnity of his words. “She will never know a day of unhappiness while I draw breath, my lord.”

Masoto laughed.

“I know.”

IV.

“ _ Malka! _ ” cried Nagisa, tearing at his golden hair in a rather uncharacteristic fit of panic. “ _ Put your anklets on— _ and don’t let me catch you taking them off again!”

“They’re  _ heavy _ ,” complained the young girl, rubbing at her feet.

“Well, you are the one who chose them,” retorted the boy, huffing impatiently as the slender dancer picked up the fallen silver chains and clasped them about her ankle one by one.

“Calm yourself, Nagisa,” said a boy lounging in the corner of the dressing-room, garbed in a dancing robe of blue and white. “It isn’t as if this is the first performance you have led.”

“I’m not fretting about that, really,” sighed Nagisa, falling onto a cushion beside his friend. “But we are welcoming Ran’s betrothed, and it will be the first bit of entertainment he’ll see in Qasr.”

“Why, we’ve been practicing since the engagement was settled,” laughed a young woman who lay on her stomach, poring over a poem that her sweetheart had written to her. “Haven’t you met him, Nagisa? Did he seem like the sort who would recognize a missed step as sharply as you do?”

“I was busy hemming my veil when they arrived,” said Nagisa crossly, burrowing deeper into his pillow. “Lili-chan! Don’t touch my feet with that feather.”

Lili put away the love-letter and sprang lithely to her feet, stretching like a cat as she ambled to the long counter beside the wall to look for her headdress. Upon finding it below an armful of filmy shawls, she set it jauntily over her brow and did up the loosened clasps of her gown.

“It’s nearly time to dress,” she said, glancing at the pins in the candle burning beside the mirror. “You ought to go out and see that the rest of the troupe is ready.”

Nagisa rolled over with a sigh. “I will. Don’t let Malka take off her jewelry again, and find a pair of slippers for Momo.”

Momo snorted and shoved a pastry into his mouth, raising his feet into the air to reveal an elegant pair of dancing slippers. “I’ve  _ got  _ my slippers. And Sakura’s decided to bring another pair, so Malka needn’t bother.”

At the mention of her name, another girl dropped from the loft above, landing unceremoniously beside her brother and overturning his dish of sweets. She lay flat upon her back, scarlet robes tumbled about her willowy figure, her titian hair pooling in her brother’s lap. The maiden opened honey-colored eyes to find a pair of identical ones glaring down at her with undisguised rage.

“My  _ pastries! _ ” wailed Momotarou, gathering them up back into their bowl and flicking the broken ones at his sister’s face. “ _ Nee-chan! _ ”

Sakura reached up and clapped her brother’s jaw closed.

“Nii-chan’s dreadfully lucky not to have you tagging about after him all the time,” she giggled, bouncing to her feet and dusting off her gown. “I doubt his ears would have stood it.”

She made a few dainty turns about the room, her pleated skirt fanning about her legs like the petals of a lily as she began to sing,

“ _ The very air is blossoming, and love wonders at the sight _

_ Have the garden flowers displeased their fragrance? _

_ A maiden’s sorrow lingers upon the breeze _

_ She stops at the doorstep, as if time lay sleeping _

_ Blind to what she has lost, as the moon to the day— _

_ How strange it is, that I think upon it, _

_ Has she given herself to me, or has she not? _

_ O! we walk hand-in-hand, but a gulf lies between us _

_ Together, then apart—I can bear it no longer _

_ A wall of glass parts her arms from mine, _

_ And my grief murmurs from stream to sea. _

_ What do you whisper, sweet Time? _

_ That she, seeing my grief, grows quiet and sad? _

_ That we meet—but do not—that the roses bloom and wither at once? _

_ My eyes glory in her beauty, but my heart is weeping. _ ”

Sakura lifted her dancing-ribbons, sending them rippling through the air like water. Having finished the ending motions, she bowed to her little audience and laughed.

“How did I do, then?”

“ _ Beautifully _ ,” breathed Lili, clutching at her own ribbons.

Sakura smiled and executed another pirouette.

“It was lovely, nee-chan,” said Momo grudgingly. “You’re going to dazzle the Iwatobian prince tonight, or I’m a stag-beetle.”

“But it isn’t Prince Haruka that Sakura wishes to dazzle,” said Lili wickedly, hanging backward off the ladder to the lofts. “Is it, my girl?”

Sakura blushed, not even troubling to hide the color rising in her cheeks. Nagisa shot upright and pointed an accusing finger at his friend.

“You’ve been keeping something from me all month! You and Lili-chan both! I’ll have it out of you tonight, so I will!”

“Our second-in-command has fallen for a certain palace lad,” drawled Lili, snickering at the look on Sakura’s face. “A lad that all four of us are rather well-acquainted with, in fact.”

“I’ve always loved you, Sakura!” cried Nagisa, flinging himself to the floor at the girl’s feet. “Your eyes are as bright as gold—your smile as sweet as strawberries—your hair as red as sunlight! You need pine no longer, for I return your affections a thousandfold!”

“Oh, my valiant knight,” laughed Sakura, drawing him to his feet and kissing him lightly on the nose. “However did I go on before we met?”

Momotarou leapt to join in the fun, tugging impatiently at his sister’s hand. “Oh, nee-chan! Your beauty steals away my very breath, and no other maiden seems fair in my eyes now that I have gazed upon your beloved face!” He squirmed happily when he too received a kiss from his sister, who slipped a sweetmeat from his dish when his back was turned.

“If you two have quite finished flirting with Sakura, we’re due to be on in ten minutes,” said Lili, looking at the candle again. “Let’s go—and give the Iwatobians a show they shall never hope to best.”

Nagisa and Sakura led the way, with Malka, Momo, and Lili behind them. In the outer chamber, the other dancers stood at attention, waiting for Nagisa to arrive. They were all dressed in cropped robes with fitted trousers beneath, and holding satin scarves and ribbons to aid them in the dance. Nagisa nodded his approval, and as the other four took their places among them, he went to the front.

“Do your best in the hall tonight,” he said, “But don’t fret if you miss a step here and there—after all, I do not think our guests know much of the graces of a Qasrian dance.” The troupe laughed, as he had intended them to do, and he smiled round at them all as the anxious knot in his stomach loosened.

“Come! Let us go, then.”

They followed him out into the banquet hall, walking for all the world as if they were nothing more than guests. The feast was in full swing, and as Nagisa entered he saw a pair of unfamiliar faces—a boy with hair as dark as a raven’s wing and a taller lad with piercing violet eyes sitting at the high table between Makoto and Ran. He exchanged nods with Sakura, and he made for the left side of the chamber while she and half of the dancers remained at the right. The other half darted after Nagisa, flirting their robes to catch the attention of the guests. Once they were in place on either side of the room, the dancers placed their hands together, palm to palm, before the musicians laid the bows to their instruments and the troupe fell into the fluid movements of the  _ Danaida _ . Round and round they circled, weaving in and out among each other, linking their elbows as they swayed like a grove of willows in the wind.

When Nagisa’s path took him past the high table, he found the chance to observe the two Iwatobians more closely. The prince had a far-away look in his eyes as he watched the entertainers, his gaze flickering from Malka to Momotarou and back again. His lips were curved in the faintest smile the golden-haired boy had seen, and Nagisa felt a warm glow of pride that their craft had succeeded in pleasing one who seemed as if he scarcely smiled at all.

The second time he swept by the dais, his glance fell across Prince Haruka’s steward, who was watching the spectacle before him in wonder, taking in the dancer’s movements with breath-taken eyes. His violet gaze was far more striking when glimpsed from close by, Nagisa thought, tossing his head so that his jade-colored veil fluttered in the drafty air; the door had been propped open to admit the evening breeze into the warm room and cool the dancers in their labor.

Halfway through a delicate cork-screw turn about his right heel, he looked across at the prince’s manservant again, only to nearly halt where he stood when he saw that the young man’s plum-coloured gaze rested upon  _ him.  _ Nagisa felt his cheeks grew warm as he took Sakura’s hands and swept their joined arms up into a graceful arc above their heads. As she brought them down again and drew her ribbons out of her sash, Nagisa lifted himself up on the tips of his toes, rising until he stood only upon the second and the first. The other dancers followed suit, their pointed feet and ethereal movements making it seem as if they floated across the chamber rather than walked. They went on for perhaps five minutes and no more, for dancing on tiptoe ruined the ankles if done for too long.

As the dance drew to a close, a pair of attendants crept from the door to the dressing room, each bearing two baskets brimming with freshly cut roses. Now followed Nagisa’s favorite piece; the melody in which each member of the troupe bestowed a flower upon one of the guests before returning to the floor with their chosen partners to finish their last performance of the night. As he signaled to the others, they leapt forth one by one to claim their spoils, the youngest of the dancers first. Sakura and Nagisa, as the most skilled among them, would fetch their blossoms last. Nagisa looked on as Momo pranced over to one of the attendants, plucking a yellow rose and presenting it to Gou. The girl gave him an indulgent look and left her husband’s side, sailing across the polished floor on her brother-in-law’s arm. Malka was next, taking a white bloom from the basket and giving it to little Ren, who clung to her hand with a grin as they returned together to Malka’s place in the line. Lili gave a pink flower to her betrothed, looking adoringly at him as he kissed the tips of her fingers before following her as she went to stand beside Malka.

When one of the elder dancers turned back to his row and Sakura’s turn arrived, she chose a fully-opened scarlet rose instead of one of the smaller buds, before dancing on pointed toes across the hall to the bench beneath the dais and dropping the flower into Rin’s lap.

The advisor’s face went crimson as he took Sakura’s proffered hand and accompanied her across the floor. Nagisa smirked at them without a particle of shame. He had long suspected that Sakura cared for Rin, but not even he had thought that the young Mikoshiba would announce her intentions in such a way.

As Sakura reached her spot in the line, Nagisa wrapped his fingers about the stem of a fuschia-colored bloom the exact shade of his eyes. He turned to the high table, intending to present it to Ran, whom he usually chose to accompany him—for the little girl was skilled at the dance, and Nagisa was rather too short to waltz about the floor with Makoto or Sei.

But as he drew up to the dais, he caught a wistful look in the manservant’s eyes and went to him on impulse, laying the rose beside his plate. The thought that the man would almost certainly be unable to carry out the steps did not even strike him as the violet eyes widened in astonishment. The Iwatobian rose from his place and rounded the far end of the table, putting a light hand upon Nagisa’s as they swept to the front of the room to await the lilting airs of song from the musicians in the corner.

The first bell broke the crystal silence and quivered like a leaf upon the air, hanging for a moment before the other instruments took up the melody.  Nagisa took the steward’s hands as they whirled about among the others, passing hordes of flirtatious couples and laughing friends, for this dance was nowhere near as formal as the last.

“I expect you were surprised when I asked you to accompany me,” said Nagisa brightly, looking up at the other lad’s face. “I ought to have considered that you mightn’t know the dance—but it looks as if you know it as well as I do.”

The steward laughed softly, letting go of Nagisa for a moment to evade the promenading Momotarou, who was spinning his giggling sister-in-law about the room without a sliver of care as to where he was going. When the younger boy was safely away, the Iwatobian took the dancer’s hands again and shook his head.

“I was perhaps too eager to learn the customs of Qasr when I learned that my master would be journeying here,” he explained, relaxing his hold so that Nagisa could loosen the silks about his neck. “The Emperor saw the dance when he visited the citadel many years ago, and he told me all he remembered. The crown prince permitted me to practice with him now and again, for I found the movements rather beautiful.”

“Well, yours certainly are,” said Nagisa. “How are you called? I cannot believe I spoke first of your dancing without giving you a moment to tell me your name.”

“Rei Ryuugazaki, Prince Haruka’s manservant. And you?”

“Nagisa Hazuki, head of the dancing troupe.”

“Ah, I had gathered as much,” said Rei, pleased. “Of course, I could not be sure that I had remembered correctly, but the Emperor told me that the best of the dancers presents his flower last.”

“That’s the right of it,” laughed Nagisa. “I usually offer mine to Ran, but you looked as if you wished to join us.”

“I suppose I did,” Rei nodded his thanks, putting out a hand to ruffle Ren’s hair as the little one passed them, clinging to Malka’s skirts. He smiled, and Nagisa’s breath quickened for an instant before it steadied itself. “Thank you.”

“What is Prince Haruka like?” asked Nagisa curiously, leaving the ground with an obliging spring as Rei made to lift him briefly into the air.

“Do not let him hear you call him so,” warned Rei, their hands parting once more as Gou and Momo barreled past again. “Haruka is rather a girlish name, and everyone in Iwatobi gave it up for ‘Haru’ long ago.”

Nagisa glanced over his shoulder to see that many of the guests had taken to the floor as well; Makoto was dancing close by with Ran, and Sei had bowed the queen from her seat with a winning look.

“Haru,” mused Nagisa. “It suits him. Is he usually so distant, then?”

“He has always been so,” said Rei, drawing Nagisa sharply to the right and away from the approaching General, whose flailing movements carved a path through the crowd as he danced. “Perhaps it was growing up alongside his cousin and me. Akihiro is everything Haru is not, and the two balance each other like light and dark.”

“What are you, then?” asked Nagisa, lifting up his chin in question.

“I do not rightly know,” Rei admitted. “The two have always been together, and I look after them like a mother…but what of you? Are you always so cheerful, Master Hazuki?”

“Call me Nagisa,” laughed that individual, spinning below Rei’s outstretched arm and coming to rest by the steward’s side. “That is how everyone addresses my father, and it’s terribly odd to hear myself called so.” He set his hands upon Rei’s shoulders and swept him backward again. Rei stumbled for a moment before he took Nagisa by the waist and followed, mirroring him step for step and turn for turn.

“Dancing is easier than I thought,” he said in some surprise.

“It comes as easily as breathing to me,” confessed Nagisa, his eyes widening as he leaned away from Rei and looked up at the high table. Ran had tugged her father down from the dais, and a figure clad in green had approached it, head tilted to the side and hands outstretched in invitation. “Look! Mako-chan has asked Haru-chan to dance!”

“ _ Haru-chan? _ ” asked Rei, his brows flying upward as he turned to see. “How can you—oh, it matters not. But I have never in all my days seen him dance in the Qasrian fashion. He will have to refuse lest he embarrass himself before the prince.”

“It doesn’t seem as if he’ll refuse,” whispered Nagisa, the two coming to a halt and making their way between the swaying couples to the tables below. Haru gazed up at Makoto, blue eyes meeting green, before taking the prince’s hand and stepping down to the floor. The two spoke quietly, Haru’s face as blank as snow and Makoto’s turned away from the curious watchers. Before Rei and Nagisa had realized it, the princes were dancing together—not the Qasrian  _ Danaida,  _ but the swanlike motions of Iwatobi’s Raqas-Almatar—the prayer for rain, which Haru had led during the first days of the drought. His slender body curved backward like a reed as he lifted his arms toward the vaulted ceiling. Makoto mirrored him much as Rei had imitated Nagisa—not quite as graceful in his steps as the visiting prince, but he did well enough.

The musicians went to their dinners soon after that, their replacements emerging from the dressing-chamber and taking their chairs in the corner. Malka claimed Nagisa for the next dance, and Makoto bowed to Haru and joined his mother for a waltz. Haru returned the gesture and tugged Rei back to the high table, where they resumed their seats. Both lads were pink in the cheeks, and if the eyes of one flickered to the dancers more often than before, the other said nothing.

Haru abandoned his bedchamber that night, creeping into Rei’s shortly after they had returned from the festival. Rei was stretched beneath the sheets when the persistent creak of rarely-used hinges met his ears, and he looked up to see Haru lifting a candle in a pewter basin in one hand and rubbing sleepily at his eyes with the other.

“Haru?” mumbled Rei, sitting up and muffling his yawn in the blankets. “Are you ill? Would you like me fetch you a tonic—”

He was silenced when Haru set the candle down on the nightstand and drew back the covers, climbing into bed beside him and tucking himself close to his friend. Rei glanced down in some alarm and felt the prince’s brow. Finding no hint of a fever, the younger lad sighed and lay back, permitting Haru to throw an arm across his chest and put his head on his shoulder. They had been accustomed to sleeping in this manner when they were children and Haru had been poorly, wailing in protest when his mother suggested that she rest on his lap instead.  

“Is there anything troubling you?” asked Rei, humming low in his throat in an effort to lull the prince back to sleep.

Haru shook his head. “Nay.”

Rei said nothing, but raised a brow at his charge.

“I do not think I will be unhappy here,” remarked Haru, as if the thought had just come to him.

The manservant’s eyes found the vase standing atop the chest of drawers, a small, slim thing with a single blossom within…the magenta rose that had been given to him at the feast.

“Neither will I,” he replied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to chat about the fic, get sneak peeks of upcoming chapters, or do fanart or illustrations! 
> 
>  
> 
> [Godmother To Clarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/)


	4. And Thus They Were Bound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Makoto and Haru grow closer, Sakura and Momo begin to plot, and Nagisa brings Rei to (joyful) tears.

“ _Thou art the Queen, the gatherer of treasures, first in my heart_

_She who enters into every house, each as a palace to Thee_

_Through Thou I am sustained, through Thee I see, breathe, hear the World outspoken._

_Thou who liveth in the eyes of Mahar, casting its light over Me_

_Thou hast but to speak a word, and men and gods kneel before Thee_

_Who maketh the soul of thy love exceeding mighty, one who knows Thy strength_

_And bendeth the bow for thee so that evil might be slain by Fire,_

_Rousing battle so it be sped by flame, Thou who gave life to Earth and Heaven both_

_And on the world’s summit brought forth Sky the Father, thy home in the waters, in the sea as Mother._

_Thou within each living creature, as much their own as Thine, their shapes as clay to Thee_

_Thou who hast blown Life into being alone, dwelling like Air within them_

_All that is Good art Thou, thine excellence dwelling in Everything.”_

Makoto passed his fingers through the flame burning at the altar, pressing his hand first to Ran’s brow, then to Hayato’s and Ren’s, and last to his own. The children fidgeted where they sat, their knees growing sore despite the cushions warding them from the flagstone.

“Can we get up now?” complained Ren, squirming where he sat.

“Finish your prayers quietly,” Makoto rebuked, marking his forehead with vermilion and passing the bowl of scarlet dust to the little ones. The prince shut his eyes and bowed before the shrine, entreating the goddess before him to safeguard the ones he loved and the folk of the kingdom. Hayato and the twins followed suit, folding their hands and sitting as still as mice.

Five minutes later, Makoto lifted his head and touched the goddess’s feet, the smooth gold warm beneath his hands. Their forenoon prayers done, they broke their fast with the fruit Rin had placed before the altar earlier that morning. Hayato found himself a small, sweet strawberry and swallowed it whole before plucking another for Ran. She put the morsel to her lips without looking at him, having known she would receive it. Ren rooted through the dish for a slice of melon, finishing it off in a heartbeat.

“It’s time for you to dress, Ran,” said Makoto, dusting off his robe as he went to the door. “Prince Haruka is waiting for you by the water-garden.”

Ran’s face fell, and she nodded.

“Yes, onii-chan,” she said dutifully, making her way slowly to the door. Hayato and Ren followed with the rest of the fruit, leaving Makoto alone in the prayer room with a suddenly heavy heart. He feared for his sister no longer, for his meeting with the prince the previous day had washed such cares from his mind...and while he had thought it might take Ran some years to reconcile herself to the thought of marriage, the wrenching _despair_ that filled her eyes at the mention it confused her brother greatly. After all, Ran had often spoken wistfully of her future wedding-day, having gone so far as to choose the robes that Ren and Hayato would wear for the happy occasion and pillaging their mother’s jewel-box in search of the most becoming betrothal rings for her little hand.

Neither was it that she found the prince unpleasant, for Makoto had seen the look of worship she sent him after Haru claimed Lord Shigino to be as highly ranked as a prince. He wondered whether it might be the fact that he was seven years elder to her, but dismissed that as well--for Ran’s choice of bridegroom as a tot had been Makoto himself, and he did not think her yet old enough to trouble herself over such a matter. As the footsteps of the three children died away down the corridor, Makoto let himself out the opposite door with a sigh and made his way to the council chambers to discuss the preparations for the betrothal ceremony with Gou and Rin.

II.

Haru was stretched below a bayberry tree, gazing up at the violet drops scattered across the branches. From where he lay, it seemed as if they dotted the skies as well, and he looked idly into the heavens as he waited for the Princess Ran to arrive. He blinked sleepily as the sun struck his brow--and realized that noon must have struck some minutes past. The prince sat up hurriedly and cast a glance about the garden.

He was alone.

The prince made to recline into the grass, but a soft, trembling sound broke upon his ears and he pushed himself to his knees, wondering whether some small animal had come to harm in the brush. It sounded between the shrubs again, this time accompanied by another whimper. Haru went to the hedge on hands and knees, peering between the thorny twigs as he sought the source of the cry. At first he knew not what he looked upon--blue-green entwined with orange, sooty black mingling with sunset rose. He squinted, and suddenly he understood that it was none other than Ran, wrapped in the embrace of Lord Shigino’s son.

“ _No_ , Hayato,” wept the princess, her face hidden in the lad’s neck. “He will take me back to Iwatobi with him, and you shall have to stay for Ren--I _can’t_ be away from you, not even for a day. You promised to wed _me_ , and I you.”

Hayato’s only answer was a sob. “What shall we do, Ran? If we run away, the folk of Martulah will rebel against your father--perhaps even our own people, too.” His voice grew quiet, and Haru thrust his face nearly into the bushes to listen. “I can’t watch you marry him, and I shall die if you are gone from me.”

“I wish the drought had never come,” whispered Ran, grasping Hayato as if the impassable desert stood ready to part them. Haru drew back quietly, turning abruptly and walking back to the side-door in the garden wall. He recalled his fleeting dreams of finding the one for whom he was destined, of catching a stranger’s glance across a banquet hall on Akihiro’s wedding day. They were pale, empty things before the agony in the princess’s weeping, the quivering grief in Hayato’s piping voice. Ran had within her grasp the nameless treasure whose beautiful hope lingered in even the coldest of hearts, and it was to be ripped from her for Iwatobi’s sake. Haru set his jaw and plunged onward through the flowerbeds, crushing fallen petals beneath his slippers--

One of which seemed to have sunk into water. Haru blinked and found that he stood at the edge of the ornamental lake, the quiet green of lotus leaves dotting the water like scattered spots of sunlight. The prince withdrew his foot, flung off his shoes, and tossed his overgown to the grass before wading into the lake, parting the blossoms before him as his toes sank into the mud. He had never had the opportunity to immerse himself in such a pool, for water was more precious than gold in Iwatobi and Rei would have whipped the flesh off his bones had he even _looked_ crosswise at the Dhania oasis at the heart of the kingdom.

The bottom fell away beneath his feet and he drifted further into the lake, faintly comprehending that he was out of his depth. Sinking below the water, he brushed his fingertips against the welcoming touch of its coolness about him, propelling himself onward. Scarlet fish circled around him, their mouths nudging at his toes as he circled lazily in the depths. Close to a minute later, he surged upward to draw a breath--only to find himself emerging from the water with a lotus leaf draped over his head like a cap, falling past his eyes and resting on the bridge of his nose. A peal of laughter split the glade like a thunderclap, and he turned to see Makoto sitting on the grass by his fallen robe, chortling into his kerchief. Haru raised a hand in greeting, and Makoto loosed another shout of mirth at the sight of the sleeve of the sodden white underrobe clinging to Haru’s forearm.

“Thank Heaven your gown was delivered from such a fate,” said Makoto. “If you wished to go for a bathe, why did you not go to the bathing pools on the other side of the grounds?”

Haru went stock-still.

“Bathing pools?”

“Indeed. I told Rei where they were after the feast last night,” said the Qasrian. “But perhaps he simply wished to evade another episode such as yesterday, and to spare the dignity of the poor souls who would have thought you had drowned.”

Haru paddled furiously to the shore, intent on finding Rei and demanding what his manservant had meant by keeping such a thing from him. Makoto’s eyes widened, and he caught Haru by the wrist as soon as the aforementioned appendage had risen from the water.

“There shall be no need for that,” he said placatingly, tugging the Iwatobian in the opposite direction--further into the gardens rather than toward the courtyard wall. “Come with me, Haru.”

Haru set his jaws and pulled at the offending hand with all his might, scowling at the taller lad when his heels did not give an inch.

“I should find it easier to let you return to your chambers, did you look less as if you wished to throttle your manservant,” said Makoto, laughing as his irascible companion made to slip away again, only to be restrained by the iron grip about his arm. “Come with me. I think you will find it worth letting Rei alone.”

“Very well,” Haru acquiesced, allowing himself to be led from the water garden and down a little corridor tiled in white. Makoto flung open the scarred door at the other end and ushered Haru into the room beyond, only to find himself barred from the chamber--for the Iwatobian stood as still as a statue upon the threshold, gaping at the sight that met him from within.

Seven bathing pools shimmered in the noon-day sun, cold and inviting after the heavy warmth of the gardens. They were empty at that hour, for most of the folk of the palace were busy with their work for the day. Haru took a step forward and halted again, his hand loosening in Makoto’s, a look of utter joy stealing across his face like the sun across the heavens.

“ _Makoto_ ,” he breathed, turning to the Qasrian with eyes a-star with wonder. “ _Beautiful--_ ”

Makoto noted with some surprise that Haru did not move toward the water, but stood with his cool fingers trembling about his own.

“Go,” he urged, pushing gently at Haru’s shoulder. Haru unlaced his shirtwaist, dripping as it was, and propelled himself to the nearest pool like a moth drawn to a flame. He smote in and vanished, feet striking the bottom, and he rose to the surface a moment later with laughter brimming upon rosy lips. Makoto’s breath nearly stopped at the sound; for in truth, after seeing the pale face twisted in a frown more often than not, he began to wonder if Haru laughed at all. He knelt by the edge as Haru swam close beside it, standing in water up to his chest and looking intently at the taller boy.

“What is it?” he asked, smiling as the Iwatobian beckoned him near. A white arm shot from the water and grasped him by the neck of his robes, and Makoto shrieked in protest as he was hauled bodily into the pool, sending up a plume of spray as he fell. He shot to his feet almost at once, casting his friend a wounded glance. Haru shouted with glee at the sight and shot off to the opposite wall, moving like a fish over the ivory tile. Makoto set his teeth and followed, sweeping a wave over the lad’s head as he rose for a breath. Haru dove beneath the water again and popped up like a jack-in-the box, white eyelids drooping like the petals of a lily, silver with drops of quivering light that fell from his lashes to his cheek like rain.

“I have never had a chance to swim in a bathing-pool,” confessed the prince, floating upon his back as he drifted. “Thank you.” He raised his head and furrowed his brow. “I--I did not mean to ruin your gown. I am sorry.”

“It seems as if you’ll have to be sorry whenever I find you by the water, then,” Makoto jested. “This is the second robe you have spoilt in two days, Haru. Perhaps I shall have to send for a new set of clothes.”

They splashed about in the water for a time, swimming lengths across the pool and jumping from the edge by turns. Haru climbed to the floor to dive for a third time when the door burst open, striking the wall and nearly tearing itself from the hinges as a red-headed figure strode into the bathing chamber with anger seething about him like a shroud. He cast his eyes across the room, narrowing them when they came to rest upon the princes.

“Makoto,” said Rin, teeth glinting ominously as he drew near. “You were meant to be at the study at noon to plan for the betrothal. And here I find you at an hour past, _having left me to go over the lists_.”

“Did Sei abandon you as well?” snickered Haru, flicking his sodden chemise at the furious advisor. Rin jumped back and swept his robes out of Haru’s reach.

“He did, if you must know,” said Rin, nose in the air.

“And Gou?” frowned Makoto, clambering out of the pool and wringing the water from his robes.

“She and Sei went off to look for Hayato and Ran,” shrugged the younger lad. “Only Ren came to the schoolroom to-day.”

“But Ran was meant to--” Makoto’s eyes widened and he turned abruptly to stare at Haru. “The both of you were to take luncheon together today with Sakura as chaperone. Where is Ran, then? You were alone in the gardens when I found you--and for that matter, where is Sakura?”

Rin’s neck went scarlet, and he rubbed at it sheepishly. “Ran never went to the dancers’ hall to fetch her, so she came up to the study to aid me with the preparations.”

Makoto eyed his advisor’s flushing face with a raised brow. “Very well. But where are the children?”

“Gou and Sei have been combing the grounds for them for an hour, but they haven’t found hair nor hide of the scamps,” said Rin with a sigh. “Hayato is rather too eager to miss his lessons, if you should ask me.”

“I agree,” Makoto nodded, wondering why his sister had chosen not to meet with Haru.

The slighted bridegroom set his hands below his chin, sinking back to the bottom of the pool as he thought. Neither Makoto nor Rin looked as if they found it odd that Ran and Hayato had gone off together, nor did they seem to think their disappearance was tied to the betrothal at all. _They must not know she cares for him_ , Haru realized, watching the Qasrians as they spoke beside the water. _I do not think Makoto would hear of his sister being taken from the one she loved, whatever the queen might have wished for her...but perhaps Ran has kept silent on the matter for Hayato’s sake_. He broke the surface for a breath and spoke.

“I believe I heard one of the servants say that the princess had gone down to the kitchens with Lord Shigino’s son for her dinner,” he said idly, inspecting the wrinkled skin of his toes.

“The kitchens,” growled Rin, spinning on his heel and stalking for the door. “I cannot believe I didn’t think of it. Thank you, Haruka.”

Haru nodded and dove back into the cool without an ounce of remorse over the falsehood. Makoto laughed, and the Iwatobian put his head above the water again at the sound. “Small wonder I found you in the lotus pond, then. You went to drown your sorrows at being abandoned for a younger lad.”

“No such thing,” Haru claimed, taking Makoto’s proffered hand and hauling himself from the water. “After all, I would have done the same were I in her place. If my mother had come to me before my thirteenth year and said I was to be married, I would have taken Rei and Aki and run off into the desert.”

They tramped back to their chambers for dry robes, trying in vain to keep from wetting the floor as they went. Makoto made desperate apologies to every servant they passed, but they all snorted and sent the princes on their way--for though he did not know it, Makoto was so dearly beloved that not one of the staff would have denied him his hour of frolic--despite the fact that some poor soul would find himself with another hour of mopping in return.

When they reached the third-floor corridor, Haru vanished behind the door, having faintly remembered that Rei had a rather monstrous betrayal to answer for. He searched their apartments without a thought of the chill settling in his head, but was forced to conclude a minute later that Rei was nowhere to be found. Recalled to more pressing matters by an enormous sneeze, Haru stripped off his soaking gown and lit the brazier under the basin in the washroom, shivering like a new-born colt. Once the tendrils of scarlet flame had jumped up to lick about the copper vessel, the prince rushed to his bed and wrapped himself in one of the blankets, running back to sit on the rug before the fire, which his thoughtful steward had thought to make up before he had gone-- _wherever it was he had gone_ , thought Haru bitterly, clutching the coverlet tightly about him. If this were Iwatobi, Rei would have had him in a steaming bath with a bowlful of mutton broth by then.

After a moment, the warmth washed over him like a wave, and he nestled deeper into the blanket. He thought regretfully of the brazier in the washing chamber, for he found to his astonishment that he would rather stay by the fire.

A hiss from the other room broke upon his ear, and he let the covers fall and padded to the tub, lifting the kettle and pouring it into the cooler water he had drawn before the morning meal. Haru gasped in pain as his wrist brushed the basin, setting it down upon its grate as quickly as he could. He scowled at the innocent pot and sank into his tub with a sigh, reaching for the soap--a waxy cream-colored block that smelt of honey and sugar--and scrubbed himself with a vengeance, wondering what could possibly have taken Rei from their chambers at that hour.

Once he had finished, he found that the burn promised to be an unpleasant one, for it had darkened to an angry red after the further injury of the hot bathwater. He drew his wrist gingerly up to his eyes, wincing as he climbed out of the tub and went to his bedroom. It looked as if it ought to be bandaged, but Haru knew he had not packed any bindings in his trunk. He toyed with the thought of hunting for them in Rei’s room, but decided that it would serve his manservant well enough if Haru were to wander about with the unlovely blemish upon his arm as long as he could.

Haru dressed himself one-handed, for even the touch of his silken day-gown was met with a jolt of pain from the wound. As he bent to slip his feet into broad-cloth shoes, he heard a knock at the door and stalked toward it, intent on letting his errant steward know exactly what had passed in his absence--

Only to be met with the startled gaze of the Qasrian prince, who eyed the look on Haru’s face anxiously. “What in Heaven’s name is the matter?” He glanced downward, letting out a cry at the sight of the hurt wrist. “Haru! What has happened?” Makoto put a hand upon Haruka’s back and chivvied him into his own chambers, directing him to a comfortable-looking settee and running for a cupboard that stood on the far end of the room. He rummaged through it for a length of bandages and a phial of ointment before coming back to Haru’s side and sitting on the carpet by his feet.

Makoto held out a hand, and Haru laid his own upon the calloused palm, trying not to set his teeth as the elder lad spread a layer of cooling paste over the burn and wrapped it loosely. The prince’s touch was deft and gentle, binding the wound with care and hurting it as little as he could. When he had tied off the last bandage, he lifted his eyes to Haru with no small amount of worry.

“How did you hurt yourself?” he asked, watching in horror as Haru drew his hand back to his lap and tucked it into his robes.

“I was clumsy with the basin for the bathwater, nothing more,” sighed Haru. “It is nothing. I hardly feel the pain at all now that you have seen to it.”

“Are you certain?” said the other. “I shall take you to the healers if it is troubling you--my work is clumsy, and they can look after you better than I.”

“I do not think so,” replied the younger lad. “Oh--you came to see me, did you not?”

“Ah? Oh, yes. I had luncheon sent up to my rooms, and I came to ask if you wished to join me, for you were meant to eat with Ran close on two hours ago.”

Haru’s appetite made itself known with a plaintive rumble, and Makoto laughed. “Shall we go, then?”

Haru nodded and rose to his feet, following Makoto to his study and seating himself upon a low chair upholstered in yellow velvet. He watched as his friend uncovered the dishes, ladling a generous helping of meat and vegetables into Haru’s bowl and filling a pair of tiny vessels with spoonfuls of pudding made from milk and almond essence. Once they had said their thanks for the meal, they picked up their spoons and tore into their dinner, famished from their hour of swimming earlier in the day. It was several minutes before either of the princes spoke, for both thought the rabbit stew delicious. Once Haru pushed aside his plate and turned his attention to the pudding, Makoto put down his spoon and gave him a thoughtful look.

“Unless I am very much mistaken, you heard nothing at all about the little ones being in the kitchens,” he said.

Haru nearly choked on an almond, coughing as he looked up at his companion.

“There was no need for that,” said Makoto, amused. “Hayato and Ran run away from their lessons nearly thrice a week. Rin would not have scolded them--well, not unduly.”

“That is...comforting to know,” rasped the younger boy, having forced down the offending mouthful. “I did not wish for either of them to be punished, so I sent Rin in the opposite direction.”

“Then they were playing in the gardens?” asked the other.

Haru’s eyes flickered shut for a moment as his heart clenched at the memory.

“Yes, they were.”

III.

“Nay, not this,” came a ruffled-sounding voice, along with the soft sound of leather slipping over wood. “Nor _this_. Wherever can it have gone?”

Rei raised his eyes from the heavy volume he had been perusing and cast a glance about for the source of the sound. Somebody on the other side of the laden shelves was flitting up and down the aisle, taking a book here and another there, before sitting down and rising almost at once, clearly not having found what he sought. The manservant--having found himself the new master of two hours of leisure while Haru was dining with Ran--had taken himself off to the halls of lore, eager to indulge himself in the history of Qasr. It had not been long before Rei found himself lost in a tattered book of poetry, and it was nearly three-quarters of an hour before he heard the impatient sighs and murmurs of disappointment some eight feet or so to his left.

“I could have _sworn_ it was here,” said the voice, seeming strangely familiar to Rei’s careless ear. Footsteps rounded the corner of the shelf, and the spell of the ballad was broken when Rei came face-to-face with a pair of russet eyes blinking at him over a pile of old manuscripts.

“Rei!” said Nagisa, throwing his load to the chair beside him--Rei winced in agony--and bounding up to the steward. “What are you at? Where is Haru-chan?”

“ _Haruka_ is having his luncheon with the Princess,” said Rei, looking pointedly at the forlorn-looking books, which Nagisa gathered sheepishly back into his arms. “One of your dancers is chaperoning them, so I took the chance for some well-deserved peace in the halls of lore. Lord Rin was kind enough to direct me, for he was going the same way.”

“Rin-chan taking the time to be kind?” said Nagisa, climbing atop the chair like a squirrel and running his fingers along a row of volumes some seven feet from the floor. “How odd. When I ask him for something, he usually tugs off my veil and throws it out the nearest window.”

“He was with the Lady Sakura at the time, and they were in some distress,” said Rei, frowning as he recalled the scene. Sakura had been flying down the corridors with Rin at her heel, and the advisor had simply shouted for Rei to follow them when he dared to ask the way to the halls of lore. “They seemed to be looking for something.”

“Some _one_ ,” corrected Nagisa, standing on his toes and inspecting the next shelf for his hapless quarry. Rei rather pitied the poor volume, whatever it might prove to be. “The children are rather fond of running away from Gou.”

“Their governess?” asked Rei, recalling the advisor’s young sister. “Oh, dear. How _often_ I had to do the same with Haru….I thank Heaven our own days of learning are over. But what are you doing here, Master Hazuki?”

“I _thought_ I had asked you to call me Nagisa,” said that individual, turning a disarming smile upon the steward. “And I am here for business. The betrothal feast is in five weeks, and of course we dancers shall be engaged for the evening. But there is the plain truth that such a piece of this would have been practiced months in advance, and I have not even _chosen_ it yet.”

“You are looking for a suitable tale for the occasion, then?”

“That’s the right of it,” nodded Nagisa, tossing yet another book to the floor. Rei winced again. “I’m looking for a copy of _Jesme_ , but I cannot find it anywhere.”

Rei shut his book and indicated the curling script on the dog-eared cover. “I believe this is what you seek, then.”

Nagisa cried out in delight and made to leap from the chair, only to lose his balance and teeter upon the edge before falling like a stone. Rei made a distressed sort of sound and flung _Jesme_ away, contriving to catch the dancer before he could hit the ground head-first. Upon finding himself in Rei’s arms, the dancer looked into the violet eyes and laughed, righting himself and sliding to the floor.

“Thank you,” he said, picking up the book of poetry and scanning the pages. Rei lifted his head to the uppermost shelves as if pleading for patience before glancing back at Nagisa.

“Which verse are you looking for?”

“The Lay of Dahab-E-Noor,” said the dancer, stopping at a particularly worn-looking leaf and jabbing his thumb at the faded calligraphy. “I thought a love-ballad suited a promising of marriage, and I am fondest of this one.”

“What is the tale about?” asked Rei, peering at the fluid lines of ink over Nagisa’s shoulder.

“It is the most beautiful story,” said the younger boy, his voice softening. “I was meant to fill a place little different to your own, many years ago--I was the smallest of the group and the only one who was lowly born, so my parents intended me to be Makoto’s own manservant when we were grown.”

Rei nodded, wondering what the memory had to do with Nagisa’s chosen piece.

“It was not that I should have minded such a life--Makoto is as dear as family to me--but he has always been somewhat of a mother to us all, for he is the eldest save the General. But both of us were resigned to the post until I was in my tenth year and a band of traveling dancers journeyed to Qasr from Ram-Susah. I was permitted to stay by Makoto’s side and watch with the rest, and that was the first time I saw the dance of Dahab-E-Noor, and the last. Rei, it was _beautiful_...their bodies fluttered into music before my eyes, and as I watched I could not tell whether my heart sang from their voices, from the dance, or the throbbing of the drums.

“I began to dance alone, after they had departed. It felt as if life itself was _nothing_ , if what I had seen that night were to fly from me and vanish into the desert. Some weeks later, the leader of the dancing-troupe--as he was then--found me imitating the steps in the performance hall, and he brought me to my parents and asked them if he might take me on as apprentice. And it was by this ballad that my fate was changed, that I was delivered to that which I loved best.”

Rei nodded, closing his eyes and glimpsing a golden-haired child moving lithely before him, pursuing a dream already half-swallowed by the mists.

“The tale was of a woman who _loved_ the art of dancing,” said Nagisa, his tones growing ever softer as he went on. “She had been sorely hurt as a child, and all whom she loved had left her, and she sought comfort in dancing as one might in a mother. And thus the very songs she moved to grew to adore her, and bestowed a glory upon her craft that no other dancer had known before. It became her life, and the touch of her foot striking the floor and the song billowing about her body were as dear as breath to her.

“By and by, kings and lords throughout the land grew to hear of her, and she was called to palace after palace to teach and entertain, and behind her she left apprentices who surpassed the masters of old in their grace. Yet those who looked upon them could not find them as lovely as Dahab-E-Noor had been, and they went away feeling as if they had tasted a sweet dish before being sent famished from the table. And so it was wherever she chose to go, for she was as priceless as the very music itself, and not in the span of thirteen years was anyone found who could dance as beautifully as she.”

Nagisa’s eyes were briefly veiled before he opened them again, stretching out his arms with a distant look, as if to a lover.

“And in the summer of her twenty-second year, Dahab-E-Noor journeyed to dance before a Qasrian queen, and it was in her court that she met a man named Amal--Amal, for hope. He loved her the moment he set eyes upon her, but she gave him little more than a passing glance as she spun before the court. Thus, Amal knew that if he wished her to love him, he would have to learn to love to dance as fiercely as she did. And when she left the kingdom, he followed her, and she taught him all she knew as she and her troupe traveled through the desert.

“By the winter, Amal was smitten, so much so that every thing that was good made him think of Dahab-E-Noor, and though she loved him he could not see that she loved dancing a thousand times more furiously than she cared for him. He wished to marry her, to have children by her, and at the mention of such things she would shy away and not speak a word to him for days, until he had learned not to speak of them in her presence. And Amal was cursed to love her in silence, for before long even the affection she showed to him passed from her like the twilight, leaving her sweetheart trapped in the eternal dark of adoring a woman who could not hold him so dear in return.

“Yet always she was kind to him, for she loved him in her own way and thought him fair, but not nearly as fair as the torches lit before her in the night, or the hot sands searing her feet, or the flutes the carried her from her world to a blessed realm in which a vision of glory spun before her like a diamond, beckoning her to adorn herself in gold, and he danced for her eyes alone as if he hailed her as his Queen. The image had been with her since she was a girl, and as she grew to womanhood it grew finer and clearer, for her grace fanned dreams into being and blew life into her limbs like wine.”

Rei’s eyes had come to rest upon the jade-green veil, and if he let them fall half-shut he could picture Dahab-E-Noor as she must have been, golden as Nagisa’s hair, loving her craft a hundred times more. Nagisa looked up and brought his hands to his side. It seemed to Rei as if he beseeched the Heavens to present the glorious vision to him, the mysterious spirit that had lingered by his side all through his life.

“And she saw the life in her dancing as she had never felt it before, for the cries of the _mizmari_ swam before Dahab-E-Noor like fire, and the singing of the bells brushed her skin like flame. Amal was parted from her as if by a gulf, and now when she looked upon him it was as if she did not see him at all, for the world was as dust and ashes beside the glow of the enchantment she came to know in her dreams.

“One night she was dancing alone above a courtyard when the strength of that beloved touch stole into her body once more, and she leapt up onto the balusters and spun on pointed toes...Amal watched her from the gardens, and he thought she looked like a maiden of the very skies themselves, for she danced as if the heavens themselves had made her their treasure, kissing the nimble feet with starlight and crowning her brow with a band of crystal moonbeams.

“His heart fell before she moved, for he had seen the look in her eyes and knew she had flown from his reach. Dahab-E-Noor sprang into the air as lithely as a doe, and before the cry was torn from his lips she had fallen, crumpled upon the grass like a dead thing, and Amal rushed to her side as broken as she. She was living but insensible, and though he was no healer he knew the hurt had been a grievous one, and that she might yet leave him wholly.

“She was shattered like glass when at last she woke, crushed when she knew that though she would live she would never dance again, for the fall had taken all power of movement from her legs, and with it the will from her spirit. The days went past and she grew better, though she could not do so much as twitch a foot beneath the covers. Amal nursed her night and day, denying himself food and sleep so that she might have a friendly face by her when she woke, and at last she turned and looked at him as if she saw him anew, putting a hand to his cheek and speaking to him as if to a beloved child.

“And she said that though she had loved him always, _always_ she had loved dancing more, and even now that she was robbed of it she could not give him what he sought...and so it was that one morning Amal woke to find that the life had passed from her like the dews of summer, and the maiden he had loved for so long had been snatched from the world. That very night her body was laid on a pyre and sunk into ash before his eyes, and after the burning he went to his chambers and smote a dagger into his breast, for without Dahab-E-Noor he was blinded, and no friend nor thing of beauty held any charm for him.

“But his hand trembled at the last, and the slumber that took him as the blood ran upon the floor was no death-sleep...nothing of the kind, for it brought him new life like the very breath of Spring. One of the dancers who had been beside him as he learned from Dahab-E-Noor came upon him, taking him to the healers and seeing that the wound was tended. He woke before long, and when he met the kindly gaze of the girl he wept, for though he had lost the one he loved, he knew love had not left him utterly. The tears that fell from his eyes were not only of grief, but of joy that fate had left him among the living.”

Rei took off his spectacles and wiped his eyes with his sleeve. Nagisa stood like stone before him, his face transfixed with an ethereal grace as he drew close to the end of the tale.

“When Dahab-E-Noor awoke in the spirit realm, she found that she could move again, and now her dance was unhindered by the chains of flesh, for she could fly as easily as a hawk and spring as lithely as a tiger...and as the beauty of her new shape washed over her, a light burned before her brighter than a thousand suns, and there appeared amid the stars a man. He was dressed in robes that looked as if they were spun of the winds themselves, and the jewels gleaming upon his neck and arms were glittering white stars. The phantom stretched out his hands to her, and when he spoke it was as if every lovely melody she had ever heard had been drawn into a phial and poured at her feet like an offering to Heaven.

“He was Anuka, the spirit who ruled her art, who had first looked upon her as a child sobbing by her mother’s grave and given her his blessing in the hope that it should bring her joy. Yet even he did not know the power of such a gift, and so fierce had been his prayer to bring her happiness that he had given her half of that which made him divine. When she was grown no song in the land held its fire, no dancer leapt as fiercely as he might, for Anuka found that he could not turn his eyes from Dahab-E-Noor while she lived. Always he had been with her, and as she stood before him, as mighty now as he, the ache passed from her heart and she fell into his arms as if she stumbled across the long-forgotten threshold of home.

“For she had loved him all through her days, loved him in every hymn and prayer of her craft, and he loved her in return as roses love the Sun. And so it was that Dahab-E-Noor ascended to the gods and achieved her heart’s desire, leaving Amal upon the earth to take joy in his own.”

A sob rent the quiet and Nagisa looked wildly along the shelves, hunting for its source--until he looked down and saw that Rei sat upon the ground, weeping like a child with his face pressed into his hands.

“Rei!” he cried, falling to his knees and winding his arms about the man’s shoulders. “Rei, please--I did not mean to make you cry--look at me!” He turned up the steward’s face and looked into his eyes, eyes the color of early dawn that brimmed with tears as bright as fading stars. Rei bent forward and buried his face in Nagisa’s shoulder, crying as if the dancer had stricken him to the heart. His breath shuddered in his chest like a faltering gust of wind, and as his sobs began to quiet, Rei felt the feathery touch of a comforting kiss upon his cheek.

“Nagisa,” Rei lifted his face, swollen and damp as it was, and took Nagisa’s hands in his own as tenderly as if he were brushing the feet of a goddess. “Nagisa, you tell stories as beautifully as you dance.”

A blush bloomed into Nagisa’s cheeks, but he did not draw away. The steward attempted to mop his face with his sleeve again, and Nagisa let go of Rei’s left hand and wiped away the manservant’s tears with his right, his thumb lingering under Rei’s eye lest a stray drop should escape his eyes again.

“You’re much lovelier when you smile, Rei.”

The other lad choked a laugh and pressed his hand--the one still clutched in Nagisa’s--to his heart. “As if I could hope to be lovely beside your dancing and your tales.”

A thought struck Nagisa, and he rose to his feet, tugging Rei up with him. “Come with me. Bring _Jeshne,_ for I shall need it.” Rei picked up the book and followed, allowing Nagisa to pull him from the halls of yore and along the outer corridor.

“Where are we going?” he asked too, grasping as his spectacles as Nagisa towed him down the stairs.

“The performance halls,” sang Nagisa, paying no mind to the fluttering of his heart and turning his gaze away from Rei.

“What for?”

“You thought that beautiful, did you not? Then there is work to be done, for in a month’s time I shall dance it for you.”

IV.

“...and then it sprinted away to the others with Father tied to the saddleband!”

Makoto laughed, clutching at his stomach. “ _No!_ ”

“Indeed! Nobody knew where he had gone, and the herders had tied the other beasts to the posts and left for their dinners, and no one came to look for him until his manservant missed him and went to seek him out. And there he was, bound wrist and ankle and hanging underneath the camel!”

“My, Iwatobi seems much less dull than Qasr,” snorted Makoto, drowning his mirth in a goblet of wine.

“Nay, for you have the children to liven the palace for you,” said Haru, taking a draught from his own cup. “It is your turn now.”

“This took place last year, before the General’s wedding,” answered Makoto. “I do not know if you have seen it, but Lord Rin holds his sister very dear, and when Sei came to their mother and asked for Gou’s hand in marriage, Rin threatened to wring his neck and beat him into a pulp.”

Haru nodded, for he could easily picture the prince’s ill-tempered advisor doing such a thing.

“He had but time to land one blow upon Sei’s face before Gou and Momo dragged him off, and Sei was not hurt at all. He laughed at the incident over dinner, but it was _Rin_ who paid dearly for his misdeed,” Makoto chuckled, his eyes softening as he thought of it. “Sakura left the Mikoshibas’ quarters not long before dawn one night and crept into Rin’s with a dagger... _and shaved every hair from his head._ ”

Haru gasped, muffling his shriek of laughter. “What did he do then?”

“He did not wake until she had gone, and when he looked in  the glass he nearly lost his wits. To this day he has never learned who did it, for only Sakura, Momo, and I know of the joke. Rin hardly left his chambers until hair had grown back, I remember.”

“Sakura was the second dancer at the feast last night, was she not?” asked Haru, remembering the auburn-haired girl who had thrown a flower to Rin. “She asked Rin to accompany her in the second half-hour.”

“She has loved Rin for years,” said Makoto, shaking his head. “But she holds that she shall never bare her heart to a man too foolish to know his own, and Rin will hear nothing of the matter until he knows that he cares for her just as dearly.”

“Then he does not know?”

“No, he is rather blind to matters of the heart,” answered the Qasrian, resting his chin upon his hand as he thought. “He fancies himself a hard man, one who is ruled by his head rather than his heart, and not until the day he knows himself mistaken will Sakura say a word...Did you ever have a sweetheart, Haru?”

“A sweetheart? Nay, never,” said Haru, rather amused at the thought. “My days have always been spent beside Aki. But he is promised to a lady, and he worships the ground beneath her feet.”

“And Rei?”

“He has often lamented that Aki and I kept him from having a wife and little ones,” laughed Haru. “After all, he minds us as if we were his children--but there is nothing for him to fret about, for he is three months younger than I and not yet of age to marry.”

Makoto nodded. “Lads are often wed as soon as their eighteenth year in Qasr, but my father has told me that it is not so in other lands.”

“Then why are you neither married nor betrothed?” asked Haru, puzzled.

“There are no ladies of equal station for me to marry,” said Makoto simply, lifting his shoulders as if to indicate that he thought little of the matter. “My father would have me marry one of the noblewomen of Qasr rather than wait for a suitable princess until I am forty, but my mother is contrary-minded. Ah! Speaking of weddings--would you like to hear the tale of Seijurou and Gou?”

“Most gladly,” chuckled Haru, idly putting a piece of candied melon into his mouth.

“From the moment Gou was born, it has been a battle between Sei and Rin for her favor,” said Makoto, his eyes settling upon the decanter with a fond look that had nothing whatsoever to do with wine. “As I recall, Sei pulled Gou from Rin’s arms into his own when they were brought into Lady Matsuoka’s room to see her for the first time. Rin shrieked like a fury when Gou smiled at Sei before she smiled at him.

“When Gou was in her sixth year, she came into the schoolroom where Rin and I were at our lessons with Sei, and promised him that he should be her husband one day. My, he blushed as red as a rose at that,” smiled the prince. “Rin challenged Sei to a duel with the practice swords later that afternoon, but Sei beat him soundly and gave Gou a ring made of a daisy-chain….and after her fifteenth birthday, she and Sei sweethearted about so much that it nearly drove Rin mad. But they were wed last year, and my advisor was the happiest of the lot about it, whatever he pretends to think.”

“Did Sakura not feel lonely, then?” asked Haru. “That both Rin and the General were always with Gou?”

“Certainly not,” Makoto avowed. “You forget--the second brother, Momotarou, is closest in age to Sakura, and the palace has lived in fear of them since Momo was old enough to toddle. He and Sakura are devilishly fond of making fools of anybody they can lay their hands on, and Rin was their favourite victim. They were for ever putting sugar into his soup and pails of water over his door, and I wonder that the poor lad stood it as long as he did. He was spared only when Momo and Sakura were apprenticed to the dancer’s guild.”

Haru looked across at the portrait miniatures that stood in a neat row beneath the gilded mirror by the door. There were three of them, one of a pair of babies wrapped in the same swaddling cloth, another of Makoto and Nagisa as children attempting to give Momotarou a bath, and one of Sei and Rin standing on either side of Gou and Sakura, who sat hand-in-hand between their knights with knowing looks on their little faces.

Makoto caught Haru’s glance and laughed.

“Yes, the women always know before we can ever hope to,” he said, agreeing with Haru’s wordless observation. “They always have, and they always shall.”

Haru nodded. It seemed then that a silken touch had brushed at his fingers, and he dropped his gaze to his hands as he remembered the words of Makoto’s mother. _Once, and no more_. What had they meant? Haru brushed a closely-cut nail down his palm and spoke again.

“Makoto….when I greeted your mother, and she looked at my hands….what was she seeking?”

“Mother reads hands like others read books,” explained Makoto, folding his arms beneath his head as he looked up at the vaulted ceiling. “Some say she has the Sight, that she can look into a man’s eyes and know what he is in a moment. ‘The hand and the eye are the gates to the soul,’ or so she has always said to me. The night before your emissary arrived, she dreamt of a blue lotus and the green leaf of a lily side-by-side, and said that one should come to the land of Qasr with eyes as beautiful as those rarest of blossoms….and alter us for ever.”

He lifted his gaze to Haru and gestured toward the younger lad’s face. “And then you arrived, less than a moon after that.”

“I hardly see how I am to change anything,” Haru objected, quelling the odd feeling in his chest. “After all, I am to wed your sister….but it would have been another if not me, and it would be of little interest to Qasr who it was, for she is not crown princess.”

“How small is the pebble that drops into the pool, and how great the ripples become,” said Makoto, quoting an old proverb. “I daresay she will be proven right.”

V.

_“Momo_ ,” Sakura complained, collapsing onto a cushion in the dancers’ dressing room. “I do not know how much longer I can stand this.”

Momo looked up from a bowl  of broth and frowned. “Shall I steal all of his chemises? Perhaps it would make him think more highly of you.”

“Perhaps,” mused the girl, winding a lock of red-gold hair about her pointer finger. “But you’ve already got a trunkful of Rin’s chemises in your room, Momo. I can’t think where you’ll put the new ones if you pillage his chambers again.”

“Nagisa takes them for sleeping-gowns,” said Momo blithely. “I wonder how Rin’s tailor manages to supply him with new ones.”

“You’re both wrong,” came a voice from the loft. Momo and Sakura looked upward to see Lili sitting upon the floor and resting her feet on the rungs of the ladder. “Rin engaged the twins to creep into your apartments by night and fetch them back. All you’ve got in your trunk are pillow-cases left in exchange.”

“He is getting better,” said the disconsolate Sakura. “Where is Nagisa when he is needed? He meant to go to the halls of yore to find a tale for the betrothal dance, but he ought to have returned by now.”

“He went to the performance halls with the Iwatobian steward,” said Lili, seemingly a font of information that day. “To practice something for the piece he chose, I think. But Nagisa aside….Sakura, you know Lord Rin cares for you, do you not?”

“It is as plain as the nose on his face,” moaned Sakura, burying her face into the pillow. “To all but _him_ , it seems!”

“Then we shall have to make it plain!” called Malka, who had been going over Nagisa’s orders to the dressmaker. “It is simple. Turn your attentions to another lad for but a day, and Rin will know what he feels right enough.”

“That might do it,” said Sakura, sitting up and narrowing her eyes at her friend. “But who shall it be? It certainly couldn’t be Nagisa, for he’d never play the part well enough. Sei is married, and Rin should never believe it if I flirted with Makoto.”

“Prince Haruka,” said Lili smugly. “After all, his manservant is already fast friends with Nagisa, so you shall simply have to accompany the beloved head of our guild until you run across the Iwatobians. Did you not see how they danced at the feast three nights ago?”

“That is a worthy thought.” mused Sakura. “He is a fine-looking man.”

“The handsomer the man, the quicker Rin will know he loves you,” Momo pointed out. “Shall we tell him what we are about?”

Sakura quirked a brow at her brother. “He is a kindred spirit, Momotarou. We shall tell him, for Rin cannot be expected to be jealous of a bewildered man.”

“Shall we go and seek him out?” asked Lili. “Ran never had luncheon with him and Lord Rei is off with Nagisa, so Prince Haruka must be in his own chambers.”

“To the royal wing!” cried Momo, overturning his soup as he leapt to his feet. “Come on, nee-chan! We have a scheme to plan and an accomplice to find!” Lili, Malka, and Sakura followed, the three girls laughing as they pursued the youngest of the group.

Two corridors away from the performance hall, Rin gulped as he saw the four snickering dancers run past him toward the stairs. He knew the look on Momo’s face only too well, and wondered what trouble lay in store for him now.

Ten minutes later, Sakura and Momo had had a hurried exchange with Haru and Makoto in the latter’s sitting room, leaving Makoto helpless with laughter and Haru with a determined gleam in his eyes. When the quartet of dancers met Rin again near their own quarters, he gulped at the satisfied looks on their faces and flew up to the third level to count his undergowns again.

VII.

“Makoto, there has been an accident in the citadel.”

Makoto looked up from the letters he had been sorting to see his advisor standing by the door. He frowned and rose, pushing the sheaves of parchment aside as he rummaged about for his slippers.

“What has happened?”

“A building accident. The scaffolding on a half-finished house in the south quarter gave way, and seven masons were killed in the fall.”

The prince shut his eyes tightly. “And there are children left orphaned, are there not?”

“Aye, there are. One of the sweetmeat-sellers nearby found them all and gave them a room in her shop, but we will need to see to them by the evening. Come.”

Makoto nodded and followed his advisor into the corridor, where they found Haru emerging from his own rooms without Rei beside him. The steward had been spending much of his time with Nagisa of late--according to Haru, Rei was helping Nagisa plan for the betrothal performance with Sakura and the other dancers.

“I shall not be at luncheon today, Haru,” said Makoto, sending his friend an apologetic look. “A cottage collapsed in the town, and I will need to see to the children whose parents were killed by the fall.”

“May I come with you?” asked Haru. “I--I can be of aid.”

“Be quick about it,” warned Rin, as Haru darted back into his chambers to fetch his riding shoes. He reappeared in the corridor scarcely a minute later and followed the Qasrians as they went down to the stables to ready their horses for the trip and rouse a handful of guards to accompany them. They made the ride down to the citadel in silence, and none of the townsfolk spoke behind their hands as the royal party went by--for all of them knew why they had come. It was scarcely half-an-hour before they were dismounting outside a sweet-vendor’s shop, bowing respectfully to her as they passed over the threshold. There were tears on the old woman’s face, for she had lost her nephew in the accident. It was already decided that the nephew’s small daughter would remain with her, but that left five little ones unaccounted for. Haru took in a breath as he saw them curled among the sacks of sugar and flour, some of them weeping and the rest trembling in each others’ arms with broken looks upon their little faces.

The eldest was a girl not long past her tenth birthday, and she had a young brother a month or so shy of his sixth. There were a pair of little lads of eight and nine, who held on to each other’s hands with tears flowing silently down their cheeks. They were waiting for an uncle to fetch them, they said, and refused to look at the prince, who was close to tears himself. Rin stood scowling in the doorway, his heart bleeding for the children. He had lost his own father when he was little older than they, and recalled only too keenly that not even his mother’s tender words had given him an ounce of comfort.

It was then that the fifth child crawled into view, for it seemed that he had made himself a little nest behind a half-empty bag of almonds. Haru caught his breath at the sight of the tiny lad, who looked no bigger than the sack he had hidden beside. He toddled uncertainly forward and caught the silken folds of Haru’s gown in a pair of dimpled hands, tugging at the prince’s gown in a silent plea. Haru felt his throat thicken at the touch, for the baby before him was little more than a year old and still unsteady on his small feet. He stooped and lifted the child into his arms, biting back a sob when the downy head laid itself upon his shoulder. He rocked the boy gently as he made his way back to the guards, who held their arms out for the infant.

“Nay, I will take him,” Haru said, holding the child closer to him.

They exchanged surprised glances, but nodded as Makoto emerged from the shop with the vendor and the two other children, who were boosted up onto the horses before a pair of soldiers. Haru permitted Rin to hold the baby for a moment as he mounted his own horse. When he turned back to receive the boy, he saw to his astonishment that the little arms were outstretched toward him. Rin passed the child to Haru and swung up onto his bay, and the party made ready to depart. As Makoto secured the saddle of his own beast, the vendor drew near to Haru and motioned him to lean down to her.

“His name is Milad,” she said, her voice softening. “His mother was all he had in the world, for his father was killed in battle before he was born. Look after him well, won’t you?”

Haru spoke with a certainty that had never crossed his lips before. “I will.”

They rode back in silence. Haru held Milad tightly to him with one arm and held the reins with the other, and worried endlessly that he might drop the boy before they reached the palace. But all went well, and soon they were sliding to the floor of the tiled courtyard. A pair of servants came to fetch the boy and girl that had accompanied them, and one of the maids made to take Milad from Haru. The child set up a wail and clung tightly to Haru’s neck, and Haru stepped back from the young woman and shook his head.

“He will be remaining with me.”

The girl’s eyes grew wide with shock, but she said nothing and took the other two children to the servant’s chambers belowstairs, where they would be given food and a warm bed until guardians could be found for them.

Makoto turned puzzled eyes to Haru.

“You mean to look after him, Haru?”

Milad hiccuped softly into Haru’s neck. “Ma,” he said, raising his head and looking at Haru with pitiful eyes. The prince’s heart ached at the sight, and he drew the child closer as he dissolved at last into tears. Haru nodded, drops raining down his own cheeks as he rocked Milad in his arms, humming the lullaby that his mother used to sing to him when he and Rei were tots themselves.

“Do you know anything at all about little ones?” asked Makoto hesitantly.

Haru’s bewildered look was answer enough, and Makoto sighed.

“I thought not. Come with me.”

They made their way to the third level, Milad swiftly growing drowsy in Haru’s arms. Haru found himself astonished at the events of the day, for he had never so much as held a child before that afternoon. The strange yearning that had gripped his heart was utterly unknown to him, and all Haru knew was that he could not let Milad go to be raised in the servants’ halls. He would be well looked after and dearly loved (hardly a soul seemed unhappy in the palace, be they lowly born or high) but the prince’s chest ached at even the thought of being parted from the baby.

Makoto led the way into Haru’s chambers and nearly startled the life out of Rei, who was busy with a roll of parchment and quill in the sitting-room. Nagisa had given him the duty of penning the script for the performance, and the overjoyed steward had thrown himself wholeheartedly into the task. At the sight of Haru sinking into a chair, heavy-eyed with a child in his arms, Rei blinked and looked silently up at Makoto for an explanation.

“The boy has no one to look after him,” said Makoto, shutting the door behind him. “His mother was lost in an accident, and Haru thought it best that he remain here for a time.”

Haru said nothing, for his eyes had widened in terror. Milad was nuzzling into the front of his robes, and Rei laughed softly as he put away his things.

“It seems that the lad is hungry,” he observed. “I will send one of the maids to fetch something suitable for an infant. You helped your mother look after the twins when they were younger, did you not, Makoto?”

“I did, indeed,” said that individual, pouting his lips at Milad and chuckling when the child laughed and beat his tiny fists together. “Have a nursing bottle brought up, as well. I doubt the small one has the patience for sieved vegetables to-day.”

Rei returned with a bottle of goat’s milk and a bowl of strained peas, the latter of which was set aside should Milad grow hungry again later that night. Haru fretted for a while over how to hold the child as he ate, but Makoto placed Milad upon the floor and handed the bottle to him.

“He is old enough to walk alone, and does not to be held as he takes his food,” he reminded Haru, who turned his head away with a petulant look. Milad put the stopper into his mouth and sucked at it gleefully, finishing off half the milk with three draughts. He crawled into Makoto’s lap to drink the rest, his green eyes flickering shut between mouthfuls.

“His eyes are rather like yours, Highness,” Rei observed from his place beside Haru. “They are darker in color, but as bright as your own.”

“And his hair is as dark as Haru’s,” teased the Qasrian, stroking Milad’s head as he sank into sleep. Haru’s eyes softened at Makoto’s words, for he too had noted the sooty pitch of the child’s hair, as black as a raven’s wing.

“Where shall he sleep?” he murmured, accepting Milad back into his arms as Rei removed the milk to the table.

“He likely slept with his mother at home, so he should sleep beside you tonight,” said Makoto. “Or I can find one of the twins’ old cradles, should you need it.”

“Perhaps,” whispered Haru, his stomach winding itself into knots as Milad put a pink thumb into his mouth. Rei and Makoto exchanged knowing looks, and Makoto went toward the door that connected Haru’s sitting room to his own. “Shall we give him a bath?”

“Nay, let him sleep tonight,” said Rei. “Are you fetching clothes for him, Highness?”

Makoto laughed sheepishly and rubbed at his ears. “I kept a trunkful of Hayato’s and the twins’.”

Rei nodded his approval, and Makoto disappeared into the other apartment. Once he was out of earshot, Rei sank back onto his heels and laughed.

“I am away for you but for six days, and you find yourself a son,” he jested, manfully forcing back a grin at the tender look on Haru’s face as he gazed down upon the child in his arms. Rei’s eyes grew wide as his master kept silent, and the manservant shot to his feet and gasped.

“You mean to raise him as your own!” he cried in a whisper, hands flying to his mouth in shock. “ _Stay for a time?_ You mean to keep him with you!”

Haru fixed his steward with a glare, one that Rei was used to receiving from a pair of stubborn princes who refused to go to their lessons in the morning or finish their meat at suppertime.

“I will, and you shall not sway me, Rei.”

Rei sank back to his cushion, weak at the knees. “Nay, I have nothing against it. But _why?_ ”

“I hardly know myself,” replied Haru. “But when I saw him, I--I knew it could be no different.”

He left it at that, and Rei ventured another question. “Then he will come back with us to Iwatobi?”

The prince nodded. “He shall be my ward. Aki’s children will inherit the throne and mine can rule neither Iwatobi nor Qasr, so it matters little what I choose to do.”

“Haru, you are but nineteen. Can you learn what you must in time for Milad? You must be father and mother both to him, and look after him as I have looked after you.”

“You have done it since your ninth year,” said Haru. “I fancy nineteen is old enough, then.”

The steward sighed and ran his hands through his hair. “I shall have to tell Nagisa I will not be able to help him prepare for the betrothal night.”

“What in Heaven’s name for?” asked Haru, turning about and frowning at his friend. “I will manage. I did not take Milad to lay another burden upon your shoulders.”

“Haru--”

“I haven’t been blind, Rei,” said the prince, his voice growing remorseful. “I know how much you have worried for me and Aki, how much you have been to us, that you kept us from illness and injury almost from the moment you were born. And I--I have not made it easy for you. So from this day forth, I will look after myself as well as Milad. Aki and I took your youth from you, and it is high time that you found it again.”

Rei sighed, recalling the conversation he had had with Aki three weeks previously. “You took nothing from me, Haru. Everything I have done, I did gladly...but I will not impose. If you wish to raise Milad on your own, I will say nothing about it. But you _must_ promise to ask for my aid if you require it, for both your own sake and Milad’s. And Makoto--he did his part toward raising the twins, I hear.”

“Then you will go to meet Nagisa, won’t you?” Haru said, looking imploringly at Rei. “I know you were to present the script to the dancers at dusk.”

“Yes, yes, I shall go,” sighed Rei, tucking the stack of parchment into his robes. He departed with a single backward glance, and Makoto came in a moment later with an armful of tiny gowns and jackets. He and Haru dressed Milad for sleep in silence, laying him in the center of the bed in Haru’s room once they had buttoned up his smock. They sat beside him on either side, watching as the child burrowed into his pillows and took the hem of Haru’s sleeve in his fist.

“You don’t mean to let him go to the servants, do you?”

Makoto’s voice broke the quiet, and Haru looked up in surprise.

“Rei knew it at once, too,” he said. “But I cannot find it in myself to let him go at all.”

“It is not difficult to see why,” hummed Makoto, breath catching in his throat as Milad put out a hand and took hold of the trailing skirt of his gown.

“Would your mother mind it?” asked Haru quietly.

“Nay, not at all.” Makoto shook his head. “He is not a noble by blood, and the fact that you have taken a ward means nothing to the succession of your family or mine.”

“It has been a tiring day,” said Haru, hardly stifling a yawn. “Would you not like to retire?”

“I would,” said Makoto, not even troubling to hide the weariness in his voice. He made to get up, but was stopped by the iron grip upon his robe. He and Haru looked down at the bed to see that Milad had tightened his little fingers about the fistful of satin. The Iwatobian leaned forward and essayed to loosen the child’s hold, but drew away in alarm as Milad’s mouth twisted into a fearful pout and his hands entwined themselves deeper into the cloth.

“It seems we are at an impasse,” said Haru wryly. “He will let go before long.”

Ten minutes later, Milad had drawn the ends of Haru’s long sleeves and the skirt of Makoto’s gown to meet over his chest, and Makoto burst into soft peals of laughter. “My, he is as stubborn as you are, Haru.” Milad’s grasp had not slackened at all, and Haru gaped wordlessly at the baby as he sighed in his sleep, pulling the sleeve-ends into his mouth and sucking blissfully on the spotted silk. Haru shook his head and fell onto the bed beside him, rolling to his side as he gazed at Milad’s slumbering face. Makoto sat as if frozen on the other end, bound by the small hand clinging to his robe.

“You might as well sleep,” murmured Haru, kissing the child’s forehead before sinking back upon the pillow. “Rei will return in an hour or so, and he can wake you then.”

Makoto nodded, climbing onto the bed beside Milad and bestowing a kiss upon the baby’s round cheek. Having done so, he blew out the candle perched upon the nightstand and drew the covers up to his shoulders, mindful that Milad should not become entangled in them.

“Good night,” came Haru’s voice to his left. Makoto smiled and shut his eyes.

“Sleep well, Haru.”

VII.

“Of all I might have expected this morning, _this_ did not strike me at all.”

Makoto opened his eyes and hurriedly pulled the blankets over his face. The sunlight was pouring into his room like a stream, and he thought idly that the day must be unusually bright, for his window was close by the door and safely away from the bed. At once, he flung off the covers and sat up, turning wildly around for a moment before he understood that he was not in his own chambers.

“Would you care to explain, then?” A second voice echoed through the room, higher in its pitch and oddly gleeful.

Nagisa and Sei were standing by the door, smirking from ear to ear. Makoto frowned as he recalled the events of the previous evening. A soft smile crossed his lips as he turned to look at Milad, who was curled in a ball against Haru’s chest, the younger prince’s cheek pressed to the child’s downy head. Haru held one of the baby’s hands in his own, and had brought the two to rest over his heart. Makoto’s throat thickened at the sight, and for all the mind he paid to Sei and Nagisa’s grinning faces, they might as well have not been in the room at all.

“I ought to have _known_ something was amiss when Rei did not come to the performance halls on time,” muttered Nagisa, pulling impatiently at his golden curls. “He is such a stickler for being prompt to his appointments that I should have gone in search of him.”

“Never mind that,” said Seijurou, flapping a hand at the smaller lad. “Why is it that we had to hear of Prince Haruka taking a ward from the kitchen-maids when you ought to have told us yourself, Makoto?”

“We were rather more occupied with feeding and dressing the child last night, Sei,” groaned the prince, an odd, aching feeling fluttering in his breast when he saw that Milad had held tightly to his gown through the night.

Haru’s lashes flickered for a moment, and the Iwatobian yawned as he pulled his ward closer to his chest, burying his nose in Milad’s inky hair. He stirred again a minute later, raising his eyelids and leveling a cross look upon the dancer and the general.

“What in God’s name are the both of you doing in my chambers?” he said, pulling the blankets over his shoulders. “Did Rei let you in?”

“Nay, we broke the latch on the door to Mako-chan’s rooms,” said Nagisa blithely. Makoto buried his face in his hands and groaned.

“This is the sixth time you’ve broken that latch this _month_ , Nagisa--”

“It hardly matters, now that you’ve taken up residence in the guest chambers,” Nagisa said reasonably. Makoto shook his head.

“I made my bed here because Milad would not let go of my gown.”

“Oh, he is beautiful,” said Nagisa, climbing carefully onto the bed. Makoto and Sei raised their brows at one another; the dancer was given to springing energetically upon his sleeping friends, and the others decided that he had restrained himself so as not to wake the child. “Look at his hair, Sei! It’s as black as Haru-chan’s.”

“Haru-chan saw him and loved him at once,” murmured Makoto, brushing his fingers over Milad’s brow. “And he made up his mind to raise Milad as his own.”

Nagisa had parted his lips for a reply when Haru opened an eye and looked irritably at Makoto.

“I never gave you leave to call me so.”

“You did not mind it from Nagisa,” said Makoto, smiling as Milad yawned and stretched his little arms up toward the window. Nagisa cried out in delight and plucked him from Haru’s side, dancing across to the balcony to point out the sunrise. Haru scowled after them, feeling oddly bereft now that the small warm body had been taken from his arms. Makoto shook his head and followed, opening the doors for Nagisa as he strode out onto the gallery. Milad rubbed his eyes and looked about him in wonder as the golden light stole over the roofs like a kiss, turning the fish ponds in the gardens below scarlet and orange in its glory. Sei and Haru went to join them, Nagisa surrendering the little one to Haru as soon as he stepped onto the balcony beside him. Together, the five gazed out upon the palace, silent in the lingering beauty of the dawn. Milad was the first to stir, whimpering in Haru’s arms and straining back toward the bedchamber.

“He will have to be fed and changed,” said Makoto with a yawn, taking Milad from Haru and padding into the washroom. Haru remained on the balcony for a moment or so longer, bewildered at all that had happened since his arrival four days earlier. There was Milad, of course, and the lost feeling that had overtaken him when Rei began to spend his time away from their chambers with Nagisa. But that had already begun to fade, for even without Rei, Haru scarcely found himself alone. Makoto had dined with him twice every day since their meeting, and the two princes were rarely far from the other’s side. And now the Qasrian was drawing a bath for Milad in the bathing chamber, for all the world as if he had done nothing else all his life.

Haru realized in that instant that he had never quite had a friend. Aki, of course, was as good as his brother, and Rei was a strange meld of mother and brother to them both. Makoto was the first whom Haru could call so, and he found with a flicker of surprise that he did not mind it at all. The rest of the Qasrians were fast becoming friends, as well--Momo and the incorrigible Sakura, who had sought his help some days earlier for the latter’s quest to win Lord Matsuoka’s heart--sprightly Nagisa and the jovial Seijurou, the former of whom had affixed himself cheerfully to Rei’s side and returned the boyhood that Aki and Haru had unceremoniously stolen from him. Haru knew he would always be grateful for it, and took in a breath as the doors flew open yet again and the Matsuoka siblings let themselves into his sitting-room. The next instant, he heard Gou cooing in the washroom and Milad’s laughter, coupled with Makoto’s anxious pleas for her to take care as she held him and Rin’s short request to be allowed to bathe the child as well. Not a moment later, Sakura and Momo burst through the adjoining door, rushing to the gallery to leap onto the back of their long-suffering brother.

Haru looked toward the west, where Iwatobi still lay in the paling dark before sunrise. Aki was there, Aki who had commenced his courtship with Jun, and the chambers for three little lads who had grown up together, eaten at the same table, bathed in the same tub, lain side by side in the same bed when childish fevers had stilled their play for an afternoon or two.

He belonged here as much as he had to those often-abused rooms with the double sleeping chamber and twin armoires, one filled with cropped gowns and the other overflowing with long ones. As Rei came tripping sleepily into the room, Haru shook himself and went out, enfolding the younger lad in an embrace.

“What is it, Haru?” mumbled Rei, even as his own arms wrapped about Haru’s shoulders.

“I _am_ happy,” he whispered, swallowing the sob that rose in his throat. “As happy as I was in Iwatobi, Rei.”

The steward laughed and looked toward the balcony, where Nagisa stood in the early morning light, his yellow hair glittering where the sunbeams stooped to brush it. His russet eyes were fixed upon something in the courtyard below, and Sei was restraining him from vaulting over the edge as he waved at the small figure in excitement.

_“Aunt Azar!_ ” he called. “ _Keep a new-laid egg aside for my breakfast, won’t you_?”

Makoto snorted, shutting the washroom door behind him with a freshly-bathed Milad on his shoulder. The child fluttered his little hands at Haru at once, and the prince took him into his arms and blew heavily into his neck, making the child laugh as he squirmed away. Rei went out onto the balcony, and Makoto smiled at the chuckling Milad.

“Six days,” he breathed, looking at the pair of them with wonder in his eyes. “Not even a week, and already you have changed us for ever.”

Haru parted his lips for an apology, but Makoto shook his head.

“Thank you, Haru.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to chat about the fic, get sneak peeks of upcoming chapters, or do fanart or illustrations! 
> 
>  
> 
> [Godmother To Clarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/)


	5. Quarrels and a Kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Rin acts the fool and is punished accordingly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Expect fewer updates from now on, but I will make them regular again fairly soon.

Rei sat alone in the study, surrounded by sketching-pencils and parchment. Many of the crumpled leaves bore the pictures of colorful garments, drawn with careful hands and then flung aside by their maker. The portrait before Rei was of a faceless woman in a scarlet gown embroidered in gold (the steward had taken Haru’s gilding paint for this) and laced with golden ribbon. Flecks of gilt dotted the woman’s neck and arms, which were unadorned but for a pair of thin bangles upon her wrists. The manservant sighed as he stroked his quill across the hem of the deep yellow chemise, half pleased and half-weary as he finished the eleventh drawing of the costume that Sakura would wear at the engagement festival. 

_ Sakura.  _ Rei shook his head as he recalled the previous week, during which several unexpected happenings had come to pass. First, there was Haru bursting into their chambers with a child (whom the prince summarily declared his ward), Haru declaring that he would raise the boy himself, and then Nagisa’s choice of lead dancer for the  _ Lay of Dahab-E-Noor.  _

* * *

“Come to attention!” barked Nagisa, clapping his hands together as he, Rei, and the rest of the dancing-troupe were gathered in the largest dressing room. “As you have no doubt realized, we have a betrothal feast to entertain at five weeks from now, and nothing readied for the day.”

A handful of the younger dancers exchanged anxious looks, but the majority smirked carelessly up at the boy perched on a box beside the visiting prince’s manservant. This was a speech they had heard all too often before, but the final performance was never a particle short of magnificent. 

“Do not look at me so,” warned Nagisa, eyeing the large cushion where Malka, Lili, and Momo sat clustered around Sakura like bees round a honeypot. “I have chosen a difficult piece, and it is nothing to sneer at. It has not been danced in the kingdom for many years, but it is time that Qasr saw a performance of  _ Dahab-E-Noor  _ again.”

Silence fell. Momo’s jaw dropped, and he mouthed the words as if uncertain he had heard them. The dance was exceedingly difficult and rarely done, and most of the troupe had never so much as seen it. By and by, the whispers died away, and Nagisa braced himself for the next blow. 

“I have here the list of roles,” he said, waving a long roll of parchment at the murmuring congregation. “Hush, so I may read it.” He took a deep breath and began, his heartbeat steadying at the sight of an encouraging look from Rei. 

“I shall be playing the part of Amal, Dahab-E-Noor’s sweetheart.”

It was as if the dancers had been struck by lightning, for they fell silent and then began to speak at once, shouting over one another at the horrifying thought that the most skilled dancer among them had taken a smaller role….leaving one of  _ them  _ to play the  part of Dahab-E-Noor herself. Nagisa winced, but the furrow in his brow smoothed at once as Rei shouted for silence. 

“Sakura, you shall dance Dahab-E-Noor.”

Sakura shot to her feet and cried out in protest. “Nagisa, you know I cannot do such a thing! I am terribly clumsy beside you, and—”

“ _ Fierce _ ,” nodded Rei, speaking for his friend. “Am I correct in believing you know the tale?”

“Why, of course—every dancer knows it—but—”

“Nagisa chose not to play the leading role because he does not have the passion for the part,” Rei explained. “Oh, he is skilled, but he does not dance with the reckless abandon of the maiden in the tale. I have been here for but a week, but even I can see that you fit the character well.”

Sakura’s mouth opened and closed like that of a stunned fish, and the only sound that escaped her lips was a strangled sort of gurgle. She sat down without complaint, shoulders quaking almost imperceptibly, and turned her face up to Rei again with a determined look. Nagisa smiled. 

“ _ That  _ is Dahab-E-Noor, there,” he said soothingly. “Do not fear. The dance will not be easy, but there is hardly a soul in this troupe who could hope to do it better than you shall. Rei—the next part—”

“Ah, yes.” Rei fumbled with his spectacles and read out the next name. “Malka, you shall play the lady who weds Amal.”

They went on down the list until all forty-nine dancers had received their roles, from Sakura’s assignment as Dahab-E-Noor to a small lad of ten, one of the youngest, who was to play Amal’s favorite pupil. 

“I shall have the dances ready for you tomorrow, but to-night we ought to read our lines,” said Nagisa, taking a stack of playbooks from Rei and passing them to Sakura, who took two for herself and Momo before distributing them to the others. Rei had sent his work to the palace scribes that morning, and the neat pile of books had arrived at the dancer’s quarters early in the afternoon. 

“Who is to play Anuka?” murmured Rei, as the excited dancers opened their playbooks and hunted through the pages for their opening lines. “His was the one part you have not given—shall you play it as well as Amal?”

“It is but a short dance and a simple one, at the very end of the performance,” whispered Nagisa, watching as Momo essayed to fight his elder sister for the more neatly-bound book. “I thought perhaps—if it were not too much of a burden—you might take the part, Rei. After all, I have seen your drawings for Anuka’s robes, and I could see them upon no other but you. I had wondered if Rin might be suitable, but he is just as fiery as Sakura, while Anuka is nothing of the sort.”

Rei thought for a moment, guilt stirring uneasily in his stomach. He had never been parted from Haru for so long, and what with his absent-minded master having taken a ward….Rei knew Haru would do his best for Milad, but suffered no delusions that the prince knew the first thing that had to be done for a child.

“Rei? Do….do you not wish to? I will ask Rin, then—it is no trouble—”

“Nay, Nagisa, I  _ do  _ wish to,” muttered Rei, shooting pointed looks at Malka and Lili, who had turned to stare curiously at the two lads standing at the front of the room. “But a rather unforeseen circumstance arose earlier in the evening.”

“What has happened?”  asked Nagisa, putting his head to the side like an inquisitive sparrow. “Is Prince Haru-chan well?”

The steward nodded, paying no mind to the impertinent pet-name after having heard it close to thirty times. “Did you hear of the accident in the lower town this morning?”

“Indeed I did. Makoto and Rin went out to bring the orphaned children back to the palace, did they not?”

“What you have  _ not  _ heard is that Haru accompanied them and was rather enchanted with the youngest of the children,” said Rei. “He has taken the little one as his ward, and….Haru would be terribly hurt to hear me say so, but he did not even remember to feed his pet kitten when we were lads ourselves. Aki had to give the poor thing back to the kitchens for the mice, else it should have starved to death.”

“Of course you must not leave him, then,” said Nagisa placatingly, much as he had spoken to Sakura. “Your place is by his side. But did he seem as if he might forget to care for the babe?”

Rei frowned, recalling the soft, yearning look that crossed Haru’s face whenever his gaze fell upon little Milad, and understood to his astonishment that Nagisa had spoken truly. 

“Nay, not at all,” he replied slowly, remembering Haru fussing with the bottle of milk and watching Milad drink with wide eyes, frightened lest the tot should choke upon his supper. “Perhaps  _ I  _ am hurt, is all. He told me before I left our chambers that I had spent enough of my life upon his and his cousin’s, and that it was time that I live my own. It was—I was upheld by the knowledge that the pair of them needed me, and it is a sore blow to find that Haru does not.”

“He shall always need you,” comforted Nagisa, blind to the fact that forty-nine curious pairs of eyes were observing the exchange above forty-nine nearly identical grins. “After all, children always need their mothers, even after they are grown.”

Rei coughed to hide a smile of thanks, and then nodded. “I will play Anuka, then, if you will have me.”

Nagisa nodded in satisfaction, and then called the others back to attention. Rei noticed that their noses were studiously buried in the playbooks, and marveled that the dancers were so earnest concerning their work. Nagisa poked an elbow into his side, and Rei raised a questioning brow before he remembered that the first lines were his own. He opened the book, cleared his throat, and began. 

_ “Always there have been those who love their craft exceeding dearly,  _

_ The potter’s foot worn upon the treadle, a thousand vessels molded by his palms _

_ The artist like a reed before her canvas, dipping pearl and ruby on the brush _

_ The gentle poet, tracing lines of watered prayer to her books, _

_ The harpist with his lyre, and fingers tender to the strings.  _

_ And a maid whose limbs were blown of sintir’s music, _

_ One who danced before the fires to ease her heart, for grief _

_ Fell from her like sleep when the mirwasi cried her name. _

_ Dahab-E-Noor the girl was called, lady of the light _

_ With rays of golden sun singing in the dusk above her brows,” _

The dancers’ eyes widened, trading startled looks at the marked fluidity of the verse. Nagisa smiled at Rei and began his piece, lowering his voice as he sang. 

“ _ How dear to look upon her! There came a god by night,  _

_ With crowns of frosty moonbeams twined amid his lapis hair, _

_ And the very glow of tempered starlight winking on his breast. _

_ Tears stood like pearls upon her cheek, and wrung a bitter drop from Anuka _

_ For having lost all she treasured, her heart grew sore, _

_ And Anuka could not look upon the sorrow heavy in her eyes.  _

_ Slumbering, she called his name, and from his horn enchantment poured _

_ Like a flood of living blossoms bursting from the Spring, _

_ It smote upon her lips and vanished, rising to flow like wine through quiet blood, _

_ Leaving Dahab-E-Noor for ever restless upon earth, and Anuka was borne away _

_ Having dealt himself a death-wound in his grace, and scarcely now a god at all. _ ”

One of the other dancers began to speak next, and Nagisa gazed in wonder at the troupe as by and by all the rest went to read their lines. Rei’s words were masterfully penned, seeming almost like song without a hint of music to accompany them. 

“Beautiful,” he whispered to the steward, as Sakura rose and bent her arm into one of the first positions of the  _ Danaida  _ before beginning her first speech. “You had but two nights for this. How did you manage such a thing?”

“You love this tale dearly,” answered Rei, watching the young Mikoshiba sway on the spot as Lili turned the pages of her playbook in frantic search of her entry. “I could not have given you anything less, Nagisa.”

Nagisa’s eyes welled up like a pool fed by winter rains, and he dabbed at them with the ends of his sleeve. Rei turned to him in concern, offering one of the large linen handkerchiefs he kept tucked into his pockets. The dancer took it gratefully, but folded it into his sash without wiping away the tear-tracks on his face. Rei quirked a brow at him and Nagisa flushed. 

“I hardly remember my kerchief,” confessed the younger lad. “Do you mind terribly if I keep this one?”

“Not if you swear to keep it,” laughed the steward. “But knowing you, I think you will forget before long.”

“That I will,” sighed Nagisa, touching Rei’s shoulder in thanks before turning back to the others. “That I will.”

* * *

Haru crept up beside his friend with Milad asleep on his shoulder, casting an approving eye over Rei’s sketches for Anuka’s robes. They were a lovely midnight blue, slightly darker than Rei’s hair, and stitched from collar to waist with violet and silver. 

“I never knew you were so skilled with a pen and brush,” he said, absently rocking the child as he watched the elegant embellishments for Amal’s slippers take shape under the attentions of Rei’s careful fingers. “You often helped me with my own portraits when we were children, but you never thought to paint your own.”

“I never knew it myself,” said Rei, dipping his brush in the washing-bowl. “I believe it was because I was needed, both by you and by Nagisa.”

“Who is to wear this?” asked Haru, pointing at the picture of the blue gown, which looked as if it had been spun from wisps of blue and purple fog. 

“I shall,” answered the steward, smiling at Milad, who stretched out a small hand as if expecting a kiss. Rei gave it gladly, and looked on fondly as the baby tucked his palm close to his mouth and began to suck at his thumb. “The dancing spirit appears only at the commencement of the play and at the close, and Nagisa thought Rin far too lively for the role.”

Haru’s eyes widened, and he looked at Rei in surprise. He shut his jaw with a snap, and then smiled. Never before had his manservant had the chance to play at something, to do as he would without an ounce of care but for his own sake. He went away after Rei bent back to his work, softly picking his way among the dolls and toys that the adoring Gou had sent for Milad, as well as those that had been carried across the corridor from the twins’ chambers. 

“Pa,” murmured Milad, curling closer to Haru’s neck. His chest nearly ached at the sound, and he looked at the child who had stolen his heart in but a day’s time, more precious than all else the prince held dear. Haru had never thought of what he might be as a father, several years hence, for the rather undesired matter of courting and wedding a woman had necessarily to come first. He had always wished to fall in love, but his parents would hardly have thought one of the lesser nobles a fitting wife, not after Aki had been promised to Lady Jun. Milad had given him half of what the prince was too timid to desire openly—so timid that he did not even know how much he could love a child until one was given him. 

Having met Milad, the sorrow of Ran and little Hayato struck him anew, and he returned to his own room for his jewel-case, which Rei had only just entrusted into Haru’s care. Setting the child carefully in his crib, Haru dug through the little trunk until he found the betrothal gift, the set of heavy filigree that Rei had found in the treasure chambers of Iwatobi. They were far too large for Ran to wear, and Haru thought that the large gold necklace would look like nothing better than a chain upon the girl’s slender neck, no matter how old she was when she donned it for her marriage. A wave of thankfulness washed over him for the recollection that he had one firm ally, at the least. Makoto worshipped his sister, and Haru was sure the elder prince desired nothing more than the twins’ happiness. 

Yet he was not the only one whom Haru would need to sway. There was Queen Natsuko and the sultan, Haru’s own family in Iwatobi, and half the populace of Qasr and Martulah. The young man sighed and slipped the signet ring over the knuckle of his left forefinger, finding that it sat far too loose. He allowed it to fall back into the jewel case and examined the cuff-bracelets, which hung almost like manacles upon his thin wrists. They would suit an arm with a stronger build, and Haru wondered anew what he had thought when he chose the gift. The pieces did not call to him as they had done in the Iwatobian treasury, and he laid them back upon the sateen cushion and locked the case. Having done so, he tucked the box beneath his sleeping robes in the cupboard, concealing it carefully so that it might not be found by chance. 

Milad was sitting up in his cot, babbling happily at a soft rag doll that Ren had made for him. Haru often wondered what made Ren so different from Hayato and Ran, for the two were bolder by far than the youngest of the royal siblings. That very afternoon, Haru had made his discovery, visiting the schoolroom with Makoto to find Ren patiently sewing a sweet red smile onto a bit of pink cloth. He was nimble with his fingers, Makoto said, and took Haru to his own room to display a beautiful collection of embroidered kerchiefs and slippers, a glazed flower-pot lacquered in silky green, and lastly the line of portrait miniatures that Haru had seen earlier. 

“He made them all,” explained the prince, a veritable ocean of tenderness whispering in his voice. “The twins were taken badly ill not long before Hayato was born, and only Ran recovered her strength fully. Ren is as well as a child can be, but he has chosen to live through his mind, rather than his body. He has already begun his training as a loremaster, and how proud of he is of it! I will need none of the little ones to advise me when I become king, for there is Rin for that….but I do not believe Ran and Hayato think of much but their lessons and how to run away from them.”

Recalled to the present by a tapping at the adjoining door, Haru went to lift the latch and remembered at once that Nagisa had rather unceremoniously broken it to gain entry to his chambers the previous morning. Sighing, he pushed the door open and found none other but little Ren standing behind the threshold. 

“Good day, Haru-nii-chan!” he chirped, lifting his upturned palms to the prince. Haru stooped and saw a small robin carved out of fragrant teak, perched delicately upon the lad’s joined hands, painted a dappled grey with a scarlet breast and yellow beak. “I brought another present for Milad!”

“Come in,” smiled Haru, his chest tightening at the sight. “He will adore it, I am sure. He has not let go of the doll you gave him since he woke.”

Ren beamed at his words and trotted after him into the bedroom, exclaiming when his brown eyes lit upon Milad, who was biting the ends of the doll’s yarn hair in what seemed to be tranquil reflection. Leaving Haru’s side, Ren bounced to the cot and stood on his toes, bowing over the side to place the bird at Milad’s feet. The tot abandoned the doll at once, pushing it aside and grabbing at the new toy. He hugged it close and gave the little prince a half-toothless smile, before turning back to the bird and naming it.

“Bird,” he said solemnly, nodding at Ren. “Ren Bird.”

Ren gasped and looked up at Haru with sparkling eyes. “Haru-nii-chan!”

Haru laughed and lifted Ren about the waist, setting him carefully in the cot beside Milad. “Would you like to remain with him a while?”

Ren nodded furiously and picked up the doll, setting off a storm of gleeful shrieks from the baby. The two played quietly together, Ren’s murmurs and Milad’s chirping mingling together almost like a song. Haru went to the small bookstand by his head and chose a likely-looking volume with the etching of a fallen tree upon the cover and stretched himself across the foot of the bed to read. It was a gripping tale, he found, about a sea nymph who fell in love with the god of the oceans himself. So engrossed was he that he did not hear the soft knock at the outer door; Rei, captivated by his own sketching on the other side of the apartment, did not catch it either. Haru looked up when the footsteps came to his own room, and saw Makoto standing by the armoire, smiling at the sight before him. 

“Are you busy, Haru?”

“Nay, not at all,” said the Iwatobian, marking his page and setting the book under his pillow. “Is it time for luncheon yet?”

“Not for another two hours,” answered Makoto, laughing as Milad tugged excitedly at Ren’s ears and crawled into the small prince’s eager embrace. “I thought we might take the lads to the bathing pools.”

Haru’s eyes flashed, and he shot up in an instant, lifting Milad from the crib and whisking him to the bathroom to be changed. Makoto offered Ren his shoulder so the boy could vault over the high bars of the cot, ushering the lad into his own chambers in search of a bathing smock. Five minutes later, the four were ready, and they made their way down the corridors to the first level with Ren and Milad chattering at one another for all the world as if they understood each other perfectly. They passed Rin on the way, who was sulking in an alcove near the dancers’ quarters with an apple in his mouth. 

“Rin?” asked Haru warily, steadying Milad in his arms. “Are you well?”

Makoto put a hand upon his advisor’s shoulders and looked down at him in concern. “You are tired, Rin. You ought to rest, and I can have dinner sent up to your chambers if you are too weary to go down to the dining hall for it.”

“ _ Sakura _ ,” hissed Rin, tugging furiously at his wine-colored forelocks as he glared at Haru. “And  _ your manservant,  _ your  _ Highness _ .” He shook off Makoto’s arms and stalked away toward the third level, his robes flapping about him like the wings of an enraged bat. 

The two princes stopped in their tracks, bewildered. 

“What could Rei possibly have done to anger Rin?” asked Makoto, voicing Haru’s thoughts as he turned to the younger lad. 

“I cannot think of a thing,” replied Haru, frowning as the redheaded man disappeared down the hall. “And what has Sakura been at to trouble him so? She has not even begun her scheme to make him envious, yet.”

They received their answer as they passed the performance hall, where the dancing troupe was halfway through a practice hour. Sakura stood in a plain white robe at the centre of the room, poised in mid-step and offering her hand to Nagisa, who was bent gracefully at the waist to place a kiss upon her fingers. 

“Why should that trouble Rin?” whispered Makoto. “Sakura and Nagisa have been playing lovers’ roles for half their lives and it never gave him an ounce of grief before this.” They watched as Sakura and Nagisa arched their slender bodies like a pair of bows readied for the shot, before circling away from each other again to meet another pair of dancers dressed in yellow, who mirrored each other with mincing steps—halting by design, Haru thought—and took Sakura and Nagisa by the arms, clearly moving into what was meant to be the scene of a dancing-lesson. The pair of them paused by the threshold for a time, watching Nagisa’s expressive face fall into a look of utter adoration as he swayed across the floor, turning away from his partner now and again to gaze at Sakura. Momo, Malka, and Lili darted over the tile with a handful of other dancers, fluttering their ribbons through the air and endeavouring to recall the essence of a flame as they spun. 

A cry sounded through the chamber as Sakura’s partner stumbled over her foot—swung too hastily to her left—and pitched toward the floor. Sakura released his hands and raised her own to the heavens in a wordless cry of exasperation before bringing them to her face. Nagisa turned away from the maiden he had been dancing with and hurried to the others, offering the fallen lad a hand up and making certain that his ankle had not been injured before looking sternly at Sakura. 

“How many times have you erred, Sakura?”

“Close to  _ ten  _ today,” Sakura sounded as if she were near tears. “Nagisa, I do not think I can dance this part.”

“You are dancing the most difficult piece known to man,” said Nagisa gently, motioning to Sakura’s legs, which ran in a line from toe to knee. “Do not stand there and act as if you did not trip every other half-hour when we first learned the one for the welcoming party. Go and take a drink, and come back when you are relaxed. Hamir, come and dance with me instead. Anahita, go with Lili.”

Sakura ambled disconsolately to the table where the water-jug stood, and the silent watchers by the door moved on, leaving the performance halls behind them. 

“Nagisa is an apt teacher,” observed Haru. Milad was straining over his shoulder with a pout upon his rose-leaf lips, for the sight of the dancers had enthralled him completely. 

“He is,” nodded Makoto. “But come! We have a better spectacle for Milad than the one we have left.” He quickened his pace, and Haru hastened to follow, taking Ren by the hand as they ran after Makoto down the tiled hallway to the bathing-pools. It was empty but for a pair of lasses swimming races across the largest pools, and Makoto made for a smaller, shallower one, taking Milad from Haru’s arms and wading slowly into the water. Milad squeaked in fright and buried his face in Makoto’s neck, drawing up his tiny toes and beginning to wail. Ren was by him an instant, taking one of the baby’s hands and holding it as carefully as if he were touching a flower. By and by Milad opened his eyes to find himself standing upon the bottom with Haru and Makoto before him. He beat his little fists together and laughed, plunging them into the water and throwing himself down on his stomach behind them. Haru breathed out in relief as Milad paddled over to him, looking as if he had been born knowing to swim. 

They frolicked in the pool for an hour or more, for Milad never grew tired of the quivering droplets streaming down his fingers, or the cool touch of the water on his bare pink feet. But at last Haru snatched him out and bundled him tightly in a blanket at the sound of the child’s first soft sneeze, tearing back to the main body of the palace in nothing but a pair of sodden breeches in his eagerness to put the baby in a hot bath. Makoto followed, having the presence of mind to give Ren his dry things and put their wet robes into the sack he had brought. 

When they arrived at the royal wing, Makoto and Ren followed the sound of childish giggles to the washroom in Haru’s chambers, where Milad sat in the great kettle atop the unlit brazier. Fearing to put Milad in the tub, Haru had decided to bathe the little lad in the pot instead. Milad splashed about like a cheerful goldfish, accepting Haru’s peppering of kisses with squeals of delight. Makoto went into his own chambers to heat the water for Ren’s bath before returning to Haru’s, where the Iwatobian prince was dressing Milad in one of Ran’s old frocks. Makoto saw at once how fatigued Haru seemed to be, for the look on his face was akin to the one Makoto himself had worn for the first several weeks after the twins were born. 

“Rest for a while,” said Makoto, taking Milad from him. “I will see to the little one.”

Haru made an anxious mouth of worry before slumping upon the bed like a felled tree. He was asleep in a moment, and Makoto tiptoed out into the study to sit with Rei. 

“Sleep well, Haru-chan,” he murmured, shutting the door behind him. 

* * *

“And  _ then _ , I heard Nagisa tell Sakura that  _ Ryuugazaki’s  _ height would suit hers nicely for the dance,” raged Rin, storming about the Mikoshibas’ chambers like a small fury. The couple exchanged gleeful looks before wrestling their faces into tranquility as Rin turned sharply to stare at them. “What is Nagisa thinking, entrusting her to a fool of a manservant who has never danced a step in his life? She is likely to be hurt, and then—”

“Lord Rei danced beautifully at the welcoming feast,” said Seijurou, taking a spoonful of lamb stew. Momo buried his face in a leg of chicken to stifle his laughter, and Gou gave him a swift blow to the arm for his poor manners. 

“That was Nagisa’s doing, and nothing more,” growled Rin, fighting the temptation to overturn his irrepressible brother-in-law’s chair. 

“Do you think Sakura incapable of doing the same?” asked Gou mildly, as her husband put another helping of roasted vegetables before her. “There is little difference in their skill, and none of us knew whom old Lapin would choose as the head until the very last.”

“No!” said the advisor, snatching a piece of meat from Momo’s plate and stuffing it into his mouth. “But it is a difficult piece, and—”

“I heard that Nagisa had considered you for Anuka’s part,” mused the scribe, smirking behind her fingers as Rin’s face purpled. “But he changed his mind, and told Sakura that you had too fierce a temper to play a god.”

Rin was rendered speechless. The veins upon his neck and arms stood out against the skin almost as if they would burst, and he came to a halt, gaping at Gou as if she had announced that Sakura was betrothed to Rei rather than dancing opposite him during the opening and closing acts of the play. Seijurou’s spoon stopped in its tracks as Rin tore out what looked to be a double handful of hair before turning and fleeing from the chambers. Momo started up in alarm and flung himself out the door after Rin with a piece of bread clamped between his teeth, leaving the married pair in peace by the hearth. 

“Do you think he shall ever realize we are needling him to confess his love for my sister?” asked Seijurou, as he finished the last bite of his meal and went about clearing up the supper dishes. 

“Nay, he is as dense as a brick,” giggled Gou, blushing rose as her husband kissed her hands. “Come, I wish to show you the new manuscripts Lord Karim sent for translation this morning. They’re lovely.”

* * *

“Rin!” hissed Momo, having swallowed his mouthful of bread. He ran after his brother-in-law as the elder lad flapped down the corridor, keeping pace with difficulty. “What are you doing?”

Rin did not answer, for they were by the entrance to the performance halls. The two boys peeped round the corner, Momo with interest and Rin with bloodlust in his eyes. The young dancer scanned the large room, wondering what Nagisa, Sakura, and Rei were doing so late at practice. He watched as Sakura dropped gracefully to the floor and closed her eyes, one hand by her cheek and the other draped over her waist. Momo recognized the first moments of the opening act, in which the god Anuka was entranced by Dahab-E-Noor’s grace and spilled half his draught of immortality upon her in distraction. Rei circled lightly about the tranquil Sakura, beckoning toward the heavens and raising himself up on his toes at Nagisa’s instruction. At last he stooped and made as if to brush Sakura’s cheek with his fingers, looking upon her as if he had found a pearl beyond price. Then he sprang half-way to his feet, pressing his palms to his heart as if it had pained him, and looking desperately at the crook of his elbow as if he had lost his hold upon something tucked within it. 

Momo watched his sister’s eyes flutter slowly open, as if she were waking from sleep. When she beheld Rei, her lips curved into a sweet smile, yet the softness of her gaze was of one who woke and thought herself dreaming. She lifted her own hand and drew Rei’s back to her face, absently pressing a kiss upon the knuckles as if she scarcely knew what she did. Sakura relinquished Rei’s wrist less than a moment later, her eye-lids falling shut like a blossom closing its petals for the night. Rei withdrew sharply before continuing his dance, now with a love-stricken look upon his face that caused Rin to bite back an oath. Fearing that his friend should forget himself, Momo turned to grasp Rin firmly by the arm—only to find that the redheaded advisor was no longer beside him. Momo sprang to the door in horror, watching his brother-in-law barrel toward the hapless steward and throw him mid-step to the floor. 

Rei had hardly time for a startled gasp before Rin was upon him, raising his fist for a blow.  Momo cried out as Rin’s arm curved toward the manservant’s head like a blade, and tripped toward the others in the vain hope that he might stop the firebrand before he did the Iwatobian an injury—

A flash of yellow threw itself between the two, taking the clout full upon his face. Rei shouted in alarm, both at the sudden weight upon his chest and at the blood that streamed onto the collar of his robe. He put out an arm and shoved the thunderstruck Rin to the side, taking Nagisa by the shoulders and crying out at the sight of the dancer’s mouth, which had been cut open across the sharp points of his teeth. Rin lay where he had fallen, too astonished to move, before Sakura took him by the neck of his robes and dragged him to his feet. 

Momo, having come to a panting halt beside Rei, screamed in what appeared to be utter frustration with his lot in life. He turned breathlessly to his sister, who shook Rin until his teeth chattered, for all the world as if he were a dog that had displeased its master. She pushed him away after a moment and knelt beside Nagisa, sweeping back the hair from his brow and mopping away the blood as best she could with the ends of her sleeves. After spitting in contempt upon the tile at Rin’s feet, she curved a lithe arm under Nagisa’s knees and another about his waist, lifting him as easily as if he were a kitten. She rose slowly to her feet, with Nagisa’s bemused head resting upon her shoulder. He looked up at her in confusion for an instant before he spoke. 

“I am not badly hurt, Sakura,” he said, unsure why she had thought it meet to pick him up. After all, Rei could likely hold him easily, were it needed. She nodded wordlessly at his ankle, which he had not even noticed beside the sting of his cut lip. It was already beginning to swell, having been twisted in the fall beyond what it could bear. Nagisa gasped at the sight, a dull pain beginning in his foot and seeming to throb to his knee as it deepened. Rei put his hands to his mouth in horror, watching as Nagisa flexed the hurt joint and winced at the strain. The steward took hold of his ankle and gently removed the slipper, finding to his dismay that a pattern of red and black bruises already stood upon the skin. Nagisa’s lip trembled, and he turned his face into Sakura’s neck as the tears began to flow. 

“ _ The dance, _ ” he whispered, his hands seeking Rei’s for comfort. “I must train the others. I chose the most difficult piece in the land for them, and now I cannot even help them at all.” The tears gave way to sobs, and he clung to Sakura like a child to its mother. Rin stood to the side, a shamed look upon his face, unable to look at the weeping dancer. Momo had begun to cry as well, for their craft was dear as life to Nagisa, and the sight of the head of his guild weeping in his sister’s arms was too much for the lad to bear. Sakura turned without a backward glance and departed the chamber, cradling Nagisa to her chest as she made her way toward the healing halls. Momo followed, blubbering like a baby as the tears ran down his nose—leaving Rin and Rei alone in the performance room. 

“Go,” barked Rin, wrapping his arms about himself as Rei stared at him in silent fury. “Don’t trouble yourself with me. I shall gladly do myself a greater injury than you could hope to give, but Nagisa will be happier with you by his side.”

Rei swept past the advisor without a word, pausing at the threshold to look at the stricken man. 

“Shall you tell Makoto, or shall I?”

The words were a clear challenge, and Rin paled at the thought of the gentle green eyes he loved so well turned to him in anger—or worse, sorrow. Rei lifted his brows in satisfaction. 

“You shall, then.” And with that he departed after the others, his quick footsteps outpacing the slower ones of Sakura and Momo. Rin fell to the floor the second Rei had gone, angry at himself beyond measure. The advisor was fond of Nagisa, nearly as fond as he was of his own Gou. He looked at his knuckles in disgust; they were still damp with the young dancer’s blood. 

The door opened again, and he looked up in dread to find the Iwatobian prince glaring down at him with fire in his eyes. 

“What have you done?” he asked, seeming to crackle as he advanced upon Rin, who got to his feet and set his jaw. “I saw Sakura carrying Nagisa to the healing wing, and there was blood upon Rei’s neck.”

“It is no concern of yours,” shouted Rin, brushing past Haru as he made for the corridor. “Your manservant is unharmed, and I dealt my dearest friend a blow that will stop him from dancing for the better part of a month.” He made off down the narrow hall that led to the courtyard, leaving Haru to turn tail and sprint back to the royal chambers to tell Makoto what had happened. 

* * *

Nagisa was stretched upon a cot in one of the healing rooms, palms pressed to his eyes as he attempted to stop his crying. Rei sat beside him, patting his arm, while Momo bawled at the foot of the bed. Sakura was speaking quietly with a medic, doubtless telling her how the accident had transpired. 

“It is only a sprain,” said the healer, rubbing Nagisa’s ankle with a cooling ointment before drawing a roll of bandages from her satchel. “It will heal in a fortnight or less, but I shall not permit you to dance before the fortnight is up.” Nagisa nodded, his sobbing breath catching in his throat as the healer bandaged his leg from foot to calf with steady, practiced hands. “On your feet, lad.”

Nagisa grasped Rei’s shoulder and tried to stand, hissing in pain as he put his weight on the injured foot. Rei caught him around the waist as he staggered, lowering him back to the bed. 

“Perhaps you ought not to walk on it at all,” muttered the healer. “Let me measure you from arm-pit to foot, and I will have a crutch made for you by morning. Until then, I shall look after you here.”

“Might I go with the others?” pleaded Nagisa. He looked at Rei, who pressed his hands before lifting him as easily as Sakura had. 

“I will carry him to his chambers,” said Rei, “and fetch the crutch for him when it is finished.”

The healer nodded and went away to fetch a paper sack, which she gave to Sakura; Momo peered into it and found that it held a handful or so of dried leaves.

“For pain,” explained the healer. “Make tea with them and take it once in the morning.”

They marched from the healing chambers after that, making their way to the outer corridor. Nagisa clung to Rei, who looked down upon his precious burden with damp eyes. 

“I don’t wish to go to the dancer’s quarters,” said Nagisa, tightening his hold. “Hasn’t Mako-chan a spare bed in his chambers?”

“Nay, but you can stay in my own if you wish,” offered Rei. “Makoto’s second bed was made into a cot for Milad.”

Nagisa nodded, uttering not another word as Rei carried him up two flights of stairs to the third level with Sakura and Momo on his heels. Makoto and Haru were waiting in Haru’s parlor with Seijurou and Gou, who cried out in dismay as Rei bore Nagisa into the room and laid him down upon a divan. 

Gou groaned and put her face in her hands. “Rin was envious of Rei, was he not?”

Rei turned to the scholar in surprise. “What in God’s name for?”

“You were dancing the part of Anuka,” realized Nagisa, turning to Rei in remorse. “And Rin must have seen you with Sakura.”

“Why should that trouble him?” asked Rei. 

“He is as madly in love with her as I am with Gou,” Seijurou informed the congregation. “But he is as foolish and hot-headed as a child, and would rather go into rages and strike innocent stewards before making his feelings plain.”

“I wish you had let me take the blow, Nagisa,” said Rei, looking sadly at the dancer’s cut mouth. It had not needed stitching, but the laconic healer had said it was a near thing. 

“Never,” answered Nagisa softly. “I am not angry at Rin-chan, for he would never dare to strike someone smaller and weaker than he is. After all, he used to fight with Seijurou nearly every day.”

“He still does,” laughed Sei. “I can hardly kiss my wife before her brother for it.”

“But there were your spectacles, and your eyes might have been cut upon the glass, if he broke them,” said the dancer. “I could not see him do such a thing, but I have not the strength to hold him back, so I took the blow instead.”

Makoto flung off his outer robe and put his head in his hands. “Mikoshibas and Matsuokas both. If I never have to watch all the foolish passions of your wooing and wedding again, still it would be too soon. And with each other, too! That is twice the trouble.”

“Do not fear, Mako-chan!” crowed Momo, bounding up onto the bed beside the prince and wrapping his arms about Makoto’s neck. “I have my eyes set upon Malka, and she is as mild and wise a maiden as you could hope to see.”

Makoto groaned, burying his face in the bolster. “She has no brothers, does she?”

“Nay, she is the eldest of six sisters,” said the cheerful lad. 

Haru shook his head and looked at Rei. “I made up the divan in your room.”

“Thank you, Haru,” said Rei wearily. “Perhaps you ought to rest now, Nagisa.”

Nagisa permitted Rei to help him into the other chamber, leaving the other six in the sitting room. The steward and the dancer did not emerge again, for Rei had fallen asleep on the divan and Nagisa was confined to the bed with Rei’s sketches, which the scribes had bound into a small book. Rin had not yet returned. 

“When do you think he will come back?” asked Gou, breaking the silence as she lifted her head from the new script she had been set to learn. 

“Not until nightfall, perhaps,” muttered Sakura, perching upon the footboard like a distressed hawk. 

But at that moment there came a knock at the door, and Makoto hurried to answer it. Rin stood on the other side, his claret eyes swollen from weeping, and he threw himself into Makoto’s arms the moment the lath had swung from between them. The prince tightened his hold soothingly about the advisor’s shoulders, murmuring gently into his ears as he led him toward an armchair. Rin shook him away and held up a small wooden box. 

“Where is Nagisa?” he asked, his voice breaking upon the name. 

“There, in Rei’s chamber,” said Haru, pointing Rin toward the half-opened door in the corner. Rin shot him a thankful look and vanished through it, clearly intending to prostrate himself before the dancer and beg forgiveness. The others exchanged curious looks and nodded as one, creeping down the narrow passage after him and stopping there to listen. 

“Nagisa,” said Rin, seating himself gingerly beside his friend. “I am sorry. I did not mean—and your  _ dancing _ —” The man looked as if he might weep again, and Nagisa put the drawings aside and took his hand. 

“I am not angry, Rin,” said the lad. Rin looked up into russet eyes in astonishment, and Nagisa laughed. “Not on my behalf, no! But you might have done Rei an injury, and all because you are too much a fool to admit your feelings for Sakura.”

“Feelings? For  _ Sakura? _ ” Rin was aghast, gaping at Nagisa as if he had grown a second head. “I could never—and to raise my hand to Rei because of such a thing—”

“It remains true that you did exactly that,” Nagisa reminded him, exchanging a smirk with Rei, who wordlessly telegraphed to the dancer that none other than Sakura herself was eavesdropping outside. Nagisa’s eyes widened, and he spoke again. 

“You care for her.”

“Of course, we were raised together,” sputtered Rin. “It is not as if I find her beautiful—although she is the loveliest maid I have set eyes upon—or that her dancing enthralls me, or as if I feel as if I have returned home whenever I hear her speak.”

Nagisa lifted a brow. 

“Certainly nothing of the sort,” finished the advisor, crossing his arms and turning away as Nagisa clicked his tongue in disbelief. 

"We were brought up together," hissed Rin. "And it would matter nothing if I cared for her, for she is far too fine a woman to think of me so."

Rei turned back to the doorway, where Sakura crouched beside Gou, gripping her sister-in-law's hand like a lifeline.

"And if she did?" came a quivering voice from the threshold. Rin turned to find Sakura standing by the armoire, trembling like a leaf. Her eyes shone like stars, brimming with happiness as she looked at the thunderstruck advisor kneeling beside the bed.

Rin made to rise to his feet, but Sakura was quicker. She breathed a laugh and leapt to his side, drawing his scarlet face up to her own—and kissed him.

The little room erupted with sound at once. Makoto shrieked and grabbed Haru around the waist, waltzing his friend about the chamber. Nagisa squealed like a piglet as Momo sprang up beside him, shaking the elder dancer for all he was worth. Sei roared in approval as Rin's hands stole down to meet Sakura's,  their fingers entwining as he drew her into his arms. Gou was jumping up and down on the divan, jostling the poor steward until he went green and clapped a hand to his mouth. 

At last the two broke apart, joy shimmering in every nerve, and looked at each other as if their gazes had lit upon treasure. “Well?” asked Sakura, lips twitching as Rin pressed her hands to his heart. 

He did not speak. Perhaps he was unable to do so, but it mattered not, for the fierceness of his love flowed from his eyes as easily as if he had shouted it to the heavens. Sakura shook her head fondly. 

“Shall I have to ask for  _ your  _ hand, Rin?”

“Nay!” cried Rin, tearing himself away and fleeing toward the door. “Wait here, Sakura! I shall be but a moment.” With that he was gone, and eight pairs of eyes met almost at once before the others burst into laughter, some slumping to the floor and holding their stomachs, while some (namely, Nagisa) found themselves flattened beneath an overjoyed Momotarou. Gou clambered off the divan at last, giggling into her sash, while Sakura bent halfway to the floor with her hands upon her knees and cackled helplessly. 

Rin returned a few minutes later, holding a tiny velvet pocket on his upturned palms. He made straight for Sakura and fell to one knee. 

“Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife, Sakura?” He slid a ring from the satchel, a slender thing of burnished gold starred with fiery opals, and looked up at the dancer with his heart in his eyes. Her face softened from laughter to tenderness, and she placed her right hand delicately upon his own. 

“With all my heart, Rin.”

The others began to shriek again, but the pair seemed as if they scarcely heard them. Blind to his unruly friends cavorting about the room, Rin slipped the narrow band onto Sakura’s third finger and kissed her hands, before allowing her to draw him to his feet and taking her into his arms once more. 

At this, the door opened again, admitting three small figures with soup-stains on their sleeping gowns. They gaped at the spectacle within—Rin and Sakura embracing in the centre of the room, Nagisa’s bandaged foot resting upon a pillow, Momotarou writhing about in glee like a nest of snakes, Gou sobbing into her kerchief, Makoto and Haru dancing from the east wall to the west, and Rei shaking Seijurou’s hand in congratulations. 

“What have you been  _ at  _ to-day?” cried Ran, aghast. “We only heard that Nagisa had been hurt, and when we came to see him—”

Rin fell upon them in an instant, whisking little Ren up onto his shoulders. “Sakura is to be my wife, Ran!”

“We knew  _ that _ ,” said Hayato, lifting his shoulders as if it did not truly matter either way. “Just as everyone knew Sei and Gou were to marry.”

“When will the handfasting be, then?” asked Gou, calling them back to practical matters. “Nagisa will be able to do little dancing for a time, so perhaps we might have it soon after the betrothal feast.”

“I want him fit to dance on my wedding day,” said Rin firmly. “After all, had he not been hurt, I would not have said a word.”

“He is right,” laughed Sakura. “I wish to dance with my dearest friend when I am married, and nobody shall deny me that. Least of all you, my love,” she said turning to Rin. “After all, it is you that has put him off his feet.”

Rin flushed in shame, and Nagisa shook his head. 

“I might have cried like a child after the fall, but I’d gladly sprain a hundred ankles if I could help stubborn advisors confess their love each time,” he laughed, prying Momo off his legs. “Go speak to Lord Mikoshiba, Rin.  _ That  _ is a task you cannot delay.”

The young man went white and looked at Sakura, paling further when she laughed and pushed him toward the door. 

“I haven’t a bit of sympathy for you, my heart,” she said. “Go speak with Father, and I will go to have supper with your mother in the meanwhile.”

Rin gulped and crept out, Sakura skipping ahead of him as they went. By and by the others departed as well—Momo ambling back to the dancers’ quarters, Haru and Makoto drifting off to the sitting room to put Milad to bed with the children, and the Mikoshibas returning to their own chambers on the fourth floor. Rei and Nagisa were left in silence, the dancer nodding toward sleep upon the bed and the steward stretched on the divan, wide awake after the commotion Rin and Sakura had caused. He lay flat on his back, long fingers steepled under his chin, watching Nagisa drift into slumber through the corner of his eye.

Close to twenty minutes later, he abandoned the thought of sleep and went to Haru’s chamber, where he stopped short at the sight that greeted him. Haru lay in his loose tunic and trousers, Milad’s downy cheek resting upon his arm. Makoto snored peacefully on Milad’s other side, with the twins’ dark heads pillowed on his stomach. Little Hayato had wrapped himself about Haru, clutching the prince’s shirt as he slept. 

Rei’s eyes were damp as he watched them, the children clinging to the elder princes like kittens to their mother. He realized that his absent-minded charge had been greatly changed over the past fortnight, no longer given to petulant looks and sullen silences, but readier with laughter and quicker to come to the aid of others. Haru rarely thought to assist Rei as he went about his duties, but the manservant had found the dusting-cloth snatched from his fingers that morning, and himself on the end of an accusing finger, pointing him back to the table to finish his breakfast. 

He returned to his own room and drew the covers back over Nagisa, who had batted them away in his sleep. After wetting the bandages about the dancer’s ankle, Rei returned to his own make-shift bed and curled up beneath the blankets, listening to his friend’s soft breathing in the dark. He had not known how closely he listened to Aki’s and Haru’s when he slept in their room, and the presence of another was jarring. The Iwatobian princes breathed deeply and slowly, but Nagisa’s breath was shallow and soft, like a child at rest. 

Rei was lost to the world before long, violet eyes veiled by crinkled lids and fists clenched like a baby’s as he dreamed. He slept heavily, or he should have heard the soft murmurs and groans as Ran awoke in the other room and shook Ren and Hayato by the shoulders until they rolled to the foot of the bed and consented to follow her to their own chambers, leaving Makoto behind. 

But try as he might, he would have heard nothing at all when Haru woke, for the lad did not stir as he did so. He opened his eyes upon the dark chamber to find a silver pool of moonlight shimmering upon the floor and a rough warmth about his hand. Haru glanced toward it to find it clasped in Makoto’s, his pale fingers entwined loosely with the Qasrian’s darker ones. A soft smile crossed his lips as Makoto jostled about where he lay and drew their hands closer to him, clearly missing the twins’ presence. The Haruka of a month previously would have snatched his arm away as quickly as he could, but the Haru of the present found he could not tear his gaze from the sleeping prince. His last sight before he returned to sleep was of Makoto’s green eyes half-lidded, looking upon his own face in the midst of a gentle dream. 

* * *

Mornings were a queer thing, or so Ran had always thought, for fate was often changed in a night and left the hapless world to bear it as it might come the dawn. It had been so on that terrible forenoon a month before, when her mother had broken the news of her betrothal over luncheon. It had been so several years ago, when Ran had opened her eyes on a fair April sunrise and knew at once that she would wed Hayato some day—and again the previous winter, when Makoto had been ill nearly unto death, and Gou had shaken her awake with joy on every inch of her sunken face to give her the news that her brother’s fever had broken at last. 

It was so that very morning, as well. Ran woke early, as she was wont to do, and sponged her little face at the washstand as she brushed her dark locks into tidiness again. Ren and Hayato still slumbered below a heap of blankets, and showed no signs of stirring as the girl went through the schoolroom and her brother’s parlor, before pushing open the door with the broken latch and admitting herself into Haru’s chambers. 

The sitting room was empty, the teak-wood chairs turning to gold in the early light, and the narrow passage that led to Rei’s room was still silent and dark. Ran crept to the door of Haru’s bedroom and laughed quietly at the sight before her. 

The two princes had been hand-in-hand when she and the little lads left the room the night before, but they had drawn closer since then. Milad still lay between them, a fistful of brown hair in his right hand and a cowlick of black in his left, while Haru and Makoto slept in a loose embrace on either side. Haru’s arm lay across Makoto’s waist, and the Qasrian’s hand lingered by his side, grasping tightly at Haruka’s slender fingers.  

She glanced at the younger of the two and found that as she had thought, Haru was awake, looking at her brother’s slumbering face as if he gazed upon treasure. As she watched, he brushed back a lock of hair from Makoto’s brow and drew him gently away from the edge of the bed, closer to him and to Milad. She knew the look well, for it was identical to the ones her father sent her mother over the supper table, or Ran’s own at Hayato when Gou was busy helping Ren with his arithmetic. 

Ran went back to her own room after that, her heart thrumming as she recalled what she had seen. Perhaps neither of them knew yet what they felt; foolish as they were, they could not be expected to know it so soon. But Makoto had not slept in his chambers for a week, claiming that Milad wished both him and Haru to be beside him at night, and Haru’s blue eyes seemed almost to quiver when they fell upon her brother, becoming unspeakably soft whenever Makoto knocked at his door or offered him a hand to lift him from the bathing pools. 

There was but one name for that look, one that her parents had exchanged over her head for time out of mind, one that she had seen passed twenty times or more between Sakura and Rin that afternoon, one that bound Seijurou and Gou more closely every day, one that was already beginning to blossom like a summer lotus between Nagisa and Rei, even. 

The heaviness left her throat as she thought of her country and Haru’s united by marriage—perhaps a year or so in the future, rather than six—and watching her blushing brother carried on horseback to the sacred temple in the palace gardens, clad in green and golden wedding robes. She knew it would be as surely as she knew her own name, and returned to her bed with a singing heart. Ran fell asleep with her mother’s sweet voice echoing in her ears, reminiscing of a day many, many years past, when she and Ren were little more than tots. 

“ _This line upon your brother’s hand tells me that he shall love but once in his life, and no more,_ ” whispered the memory of a younger queen, seeming to lay a soft hand upon her little daughter’s cheek. “ _And this beside it means that he will be loved as dearly in return. Yours is the same, my darling, and I will do all I may to help your sweethearts along when the time is right._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to chat about the fic, get sneak peeks of upcoming chapters, or do fanart or illustrations! 
> 
>  
> 
> [Godmother To Clarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/)


	6. To Wear A Ring

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which preparations are made and the princes can't do a thing without the help of a lady scholar.

“The morning’s letters, your Highness.”

Akihiro looked up from his plate at the willowy boy that had entered the room, holding a thick cream-colored envelope atop a brass tray. The lad—Jalal by name—was one of the cook’s sons, and had come  highly recommended to the royal wing to replace Rei as Aki’s manservant. At a nod from the prince, Jalal slit open the envelope with a pearl-handled knife and passed it to his master before bowing once and departing the chamber. Aki had not permitted him to sleep in Rei’s room, claiming that it would be unsuitable to take the lad from his family’s quarters.

The letter was longer than Aki expected; on the brief occasions when Aki and Haru had been apart before, the pair of them were always poor correspondents, seeing little purpose in writing when they would soon be together again. But now it was not so, for Haru and Rei had been gone for a full moon, leaving Aki waiting impatiently in Iwatobi for the first epistles from his errant cousin. As the crown prince lifted the second leaf and lowered his eyes to the page, he spat out his tea and pushed away his breakfast, reading the lines again and again in disbelief.

_Three days after our arrival, I took in a child who was orphaned in a building accident. He is the most beautiful thing, Aki—his hair is as dark as ours and his eyes as green as grass, and he has the most enchanting way of babbling at his poppets and holding the hems of my gown as he sleeps. He is only a year old, and he is called Milad. I have taken him as my ward, and he will come back to Iwatobi with me when I return._

_Rei has been well, as you shall no doubt read in his own note. He is scarcely keeper to me any longer, nor manservant. He says that looking after Milad has changed me, and he has made a fast friend in one of the palace dancers, a lad called Nagisa. He is one of Makoto’s friends as well. There are seven of them in all—Makoto himself, of course, and his advisor Rin (a firebrand if ever I saw one, and given to impulse when he is angered). There is also Rin’s sister Gou, who is training to be one of the higher scholars in the court, and her husband Seijurou, who is one of the most decorated generals of the army. Sei’s sister and brother are Sakura and Momotarou, and they dance alongside Nagisa with the other entertainers. I was here scarcely a day before I found that Sakura is in love with Rin, and against my better judgment she engaged me in a scheme to needle the advisor into speaking of his feelings for her._

_There are also the children, Ran and Ren and a little lad called Hayato, who is the son of the sultan’s head of council. The three of them are as thick as thieves, but Ran and Hayato are by far the closest of the band. I often think that Ren must be lonesome, but he does not seem to mind it, for he reads a great deal with Gou and spends his play-hours practicing with the younger dancers._

_I must finish now, for the caravan is due to depart in an hour. I send all my love to you and Mother and Father, and Uncle and Aunt as well. I expect an account of your courtship in your next letter, Aki (do not think to deceive me upon a single matter, for I can write to Jun myself if I suspect you have tried to fool me)._

_Ever yours,_

_Haru._

Aki put down the sheet, thunderstruck. He eyed it in disbelief, assuring himself that the graceful script that lined the page was his cousin’s. The crown prince had not received many letters from Haru in the past, but those he had were enough to inform him that indeed, Haru’s weeks in Qasr had changed him greatly.

As they had changed Aki, as well. The first week had been difficult, rising day after day in an empty chamber without Rei pottering about the study and Haru looking as if he were laid out for burial in the bed beside him. But by and by, he grew to look forward to his duties—the best of which was his courtship.

He had met Jun when he was a month or so past his seventh birthday, and she a shrieking child of five who found the toddling Haru far more interesting than she found Aki himself. They had become friends before long, and played together with Rei and Haru for eight happy years, until the young princes took their places in court and Jun began to learn the ways of a palace lady.

Aki knew little of Jun, little at least of the woman she had become. The thirteen-year-old Jun of his memories was forever creeping out to the stables with him by night to break the fiercer colts, forever swinging Rei and Haru by the arms and kissing their small hands, forever protesting that Aki refused to keep his hair long, as she did. It had been nine years since he had seen her thus, nine years since their meetings became no more than the exchanges of young nobles at court days and suppers and dancers, nine years since Jun as she was had been lost to him.

And when she was carried up to the palace in a litter hung with bells earlier that month, dressed to the teeth in blue and orange silk, he had found her. She sprang from the platform as he had seen her leap from her horses, landing lightly upon the marble steps and flying over the tile toward him as she had always done, her heavy locks of mahogany hair dancing about her shoulders. She lifted her eyes to him—eyes the color of the earth after rain—and laughed, and all at once they were children again and all was well with the world.

“Come, Aki,” she cried, tugging impatiently at his wrist as the Jun of years past was wont to do. “Do not think to fool me, for I _saw_ a bay stallion brought up to the palace yesterday afternoon. Let us go riding.” Jun flitted away through the double doors, calling greetings to the servants as she went.

With his heart in his throat, Aki had followed.

*    *    *

“Aki’s courtship seems to be proceeding well,” remarked Haru one afternoon, fingers buried to the knuckles in a particularly stubborn knot. Little Ran sat before him on a stool, hands crossed in her lap as Haru drew a brush through her tangled hair, gently smoothing away the snarls as he went.

Neither prince knew what had changed her thoughts of the Iwatobian, but Ran had taken to Haru like a ladybeetle to a rose, and plastered herself to his side as he went about his business. She and Ran were by his bed in the mornings when he woke, with Hayato behind them if he had not been called away to his duties as page. Ran would be ready with a fresh stick of neem for Haru to clean his teeth, while Ren would proudly present a second to his brother. After all, nobody expected to find Makoto in his own chambers of late—not since Milad had come.

Then they would hover about him as he bathed his small ward, and more often than demanded that Haru permit them to feed Milad his breakfast. The requests were always honored, and once Milad was dressed for the day, the children would choose Haru’s robes for him, removing gown after gown from the armoire until they found a suitable one.

Both Haru and Makoto were bemused at this, but neither said a word on the matter, for even the twins’ earnest efforts at easing their work were dearly welcomed. Makoto and Rin were waist-deep in the preparations for the betrothal night, and Sei’s commander had not given him leave to accompany them. After Makoto had returned to Haru’s rooms one evening with great shadows under his eyes and scraps of parchment in his hair, Haru shook his head and decided to join them, making his way to Makoto’s study every morning at the ninth bell with a squealing Milad tucked under his arm. There they would sit for hour upon hour, marking lists of guests (for royals and dignitaries from all five kingdoms had been asked to the festival), adding to (and destroying) bill after bill of fare, sending enormous orders to the confectioners and toymakers of the city, packing great boxes filled with burning-papers that had been bought from the scribes, and keeping the twins’ eager hands away from the buckets of firecrackers.

All in all, it was weary work, for none of the three had undertaken such a task before. By the second week before the festival, Haru had not seen Rei in his rooms for three nights, for his steward was terribly busy with the preparations for the dance and had gone so far as to take an armful of robes and make his bed in the dancer’s quarters, as Momo and Sakura were doing. Whenever the prince had a spare moment, he crept down with Milad and the twins to stand at the door to the performance halls, watching the dancers whirl about the room with limbs as fierce and fluid as the sea. Haru hardly recognized Rei in his shimmering blue robes and silver adornments, and thought that his friend looked as much a god as Anuka himself.

But such moments were rare, and Haru usually heard Rin’s plaintive shrieks echoing from the third level before long. He would often return to find Rin tearing down the corridor, pulling at his hair, nearly tripping over his pointed shoes as he went to beg the flamecrafters for another twenty crates of sparklers—and Makoto sitting as limp as a rag in the study, mopping at his brow with a damp handkerchief. Matters did not settle themselves until Gou, hearing of the fuss from Momo one evening, turned the men out of the room and sorted every last one of the preparations herself, before departing with her tail of scarlet hair dancing proudly behind her. Rin, Haru, and Makoto crept back into the room an hour later, taking in a breath as they saw Gou’s tidy notes pinned to the walls and a clear space on the east side where they had put the goods—Gou had called for the servants to carry them off to the storage chambers.

Then there was the matter of the betrothal gift. Haru showed his to Ran the morning after his own duties were finished, expecting the little girl to turn away in distress as she always did whenever the marriage was mentioned before her. To his astonishment, she chuckled at the heavy jewels and slid the cuffs onto her slender wrists, running to the glass and laughing at her reflection. He supposed that she found it suitable, for while she only sent him a merry, mocking look whenever he asked her to speak more openly of the matter, he never heard a word of protest. Makoto had shown Haru his own engagement present later that day, and Haru had taken in a breath at its beauty. It was a robe embroidered fully in spun gold and a shining strand of milky pearls, long enough to wrap fully thrice about Haru’s waist. Makoto had chosen the presents himself, telling Haru that he thought it unwise to leave the selection of such an important thing to a child as young as Ran.

Once the three had had a day to catch their breath, the foreign delicacies and goods for the party began to arrive at the palace in droves. Mercifully, there was little Rin and the princes had to do for them; the servants bore the foods away to the kitchens, and a small army of maids took the baubles and ribbons and fairy-lights away to adorn the great banquet hall. There were several gifts that had been ordered for the guests, and Makoto and Haru looked after these, sorting those bought specially for the visiting royals from those meant for the nobles and commonfolk.

Five mornings before the feast, Rin sprinted up from the grounds after luncheon with a letter for Makoto. The two princes were in the study as usual, Haru lying disconsolately upon the carpet amidst a heap of ebony jumping-jacks for the children who would be in attendance and Makoto struggling manfully with a box of costly lace shawls, intended for the visiting ladies-in-waiting.

“You’ve had a message, Makoto,” panted Rin, grasping the back of Haruka’s empty chair as he fought for breath. “From Sikandar. It must be Kisumi.”

“Kisumi!” cried Makoto in surprise, for their old friend was so devoted to his studies that his family in Qasr were lucky to hear from him thrice a year. “Give it here, then, and I’ll tell you what he says.”

Makoto opened the letter and read it rapidly, his eyes flickering from side to side as they travelled down the page.

“Well?” asked Rin.

“He shall be coming to the festival!” cried Makoto, face alight with joy. “And we have not seen him for three years—I never thought he would do such a thing.”

Rin whooped and leapt to the tabletop, sending a pile of fragrant candles skittering to the floor. Haru scowled and got up to gather them into a bag, before sitting back upon his cushion to count out another set of jumping-jacks.

“What else?” asked Rin, calming at last and swinging down to a chair. Makoto’s face had split into an enormous grin, and his eyes were wide with happiness.

“He shall be coming back _with his new wife_.”

“ _What?_ ” shrieked Rin, springing up again. Haru snatched up a pair of pillows from the divan and pressed them to his ears.

“Aye, he is married!” said Makoto, putting down the letter with a fond smile. “They were wed but a week before he wrote, and now that he has finished his studies he is returning home for good. The lady was a student alongside him in the monastery, a learned woman but a penniless one, and Kisumi has not yet broken the news of the marriage to his father.”

“I do not think he will be angry,” answered Haru, recalling the kindly Lord Shigino and his sharp-tongued wife, whom he had met on the day of the welcoming banquet. “But I doubt their mother will be pleased with it.”

“That makes five of us, then,” mused Makoto, as if he had not heard his friend at all. “Rin and Sakura are to be married in a fortnight and Kisumi, Sei, and Gou are already wed.”

“Leaving you with the children,” teased Rin. “Only Nagisa and Momo are alone besides you, and Momo is not even of age. Even Ran is affianced.”

Ran looked up from the bench where she sat beside Hayato and laughed. The pair of them were wrapping flower bulbs in squares of pink silk for favors, tying shut the little packages with lengths of thin ribbon. Haru smiled behind an armful of shawls, having finished with the children’s gifts.

Makoto rolled his eyes. “And had you not succeeded in wrenching poor Nagisa’s ankle in a fit of envy, you would have been among that number yourself.”

“Aye, Makoto would not have to resort to such measures to be married,” snickered Haru, exchanging knowing glances with Hayato and Ran.

“Well, that’s all you know,” retorted Rin, putting out his tongue. “I am to have the most wonderful wife upon this earth, and not even Makoto’s shall be as beloved as mine.”

Makoto snorted and sent Rin down to the kitchens to fetch dinner, and he and Haru went back to their work.

“Rin had a betrothal ring ready to present to Sakura,” said Haru, after they had passed an hour or more in silence. “He was not as loath to be wed as he had us believe.”

“Ah? Nay, it is the custom in Qasr for every lad to have a betrothal ring crafted after his eighteenth birthday,” Makoto explained, setting aside his finished letter to the crown princess of Ram-Susah. “Rin must have been thinking of Sakura all the while, for he chose opals and coppered gold. Sei’s was always meant for Gou, and she helped him find the rubies for it.”

“And Nagisa?” asked Haru.

“He chose silver set with amethyst,” said the other, wetting his throat with elderflower cordial. “His family is not wealthy, and he had only his wages to spend upon it..”

Perhaps hearing the unspoken question—the one Haru had truly wished to ask—Makoto turned back to his friend. “Do you wish to see mine?”

Without waiting for an answer, Makoto left the study and disappeared down the narrow corridor, beckoning to Haru to follow him. The two emerged into Makoto’s bedchamber, where the Qasrian went to his jewel-case and removed a tiny box of polished sandalwood, which he handed to Haru.

It was a beautiful thing, worked in fine yellow gold and set with dark sapphires that shone like evening pools in the weak light, sapphires twinkling in the hearts of golden lilies, and Haru was reminded at once of the necklace he had worn to the leaving feast in Iwatobi.

“It is rather large,” said Haru in surprise, sliding it onto the third finger of his right hand. “You shall have to rework the band before you are wed, for it is large enough for a man’s finger.”

“It is always done so,” laughed Makoto. “Father had to put his ring on my mother’s smallest finger before he sent it to the goldsmith again, for he had expected a princess to have dainty hands. But hers are stronger and broader than his.”

Haru held up his hand to the skylight, admiring the way the jewels caught the beams of the dying sun to the west. The sharp white glow danced over the gems like fire, and he caught his breath as they flashed once, then twice, like a ship signaling the shore under the heavy cloak of darkness.

“You chose well,” said the Iwatobian, slipping off the ring. It lingered for a moment upon his knuckle before he tugged it free, dropping it into Makoto’s hand and watching as he tucked it gently into its box.

“You do not share the custom at home, then?” Makoto asked, locking the ring back into the jewel-case.

Haru shook his head. “Nay, we do not have betrothal rings until the engaged pair signs the intention of marriage. I chose one from my childhood for Ran.”

“Speaking of betrothals, I am terribly glad we have nothing left to do for yours,” sighed Makoto, collapsing onto his bed. “These past weeks have been a trial.”

Haru nodded, falling back onto the soft coverlet beside him. “These matters would have fallen to my care at home, as well.”

“Will your family be attending?” asked Makoto, turning toward Haru. “I know their reply is due to come tomorrow, but perhaps you know already.”

“Yes, I do. My parents will be in attendance, as will my aunt—but not Aki or my uncle, I am afraid,” said Haru. “Aki has begun his courtship, and my uncle must remain to oversee it.”

“That is a shame,” said the Qasrian, toying with the tassels of his bolster. “You have spoken so much of Aki, and I was anxious to meet him.”

Haru flushed, the palest hint of rose crossing his alabaster cheeks. “He is to be married soon, so he cannot leave his intended.”

“Nay, of course not,” said Makoto, closing his eyes. Haru followed suit, and they lay in companionable silence for a time until the sound of a wail broke from the next room. Haru groaned and rose to his feet, touching Makoto’s elbow in farewell.

“I must see to Milad,” he whispered, departing the chamber on tiptoe. “Sleep well, Makoto.”

He stole through the connecting door and into his own room, where Milad had woken from his slumber, clutching the bars of his cot and crying as if his small heart would break. Haru’s weariness left him at once, for he had long since learned that the child only wept so when he missed his mother. Milad stretched up his small hands, pleading wordlessly for Haru to comfort him. The prince took the tiny lad into his arms, humming softly as he bounced him on his shoulder. By and by Milad’s sobbing quieted and before long he was asleep, his feverish brow resting uneasily on Haru’s neck. Haru made to lay him down in the crib again, only to be stopped in his tracks when Milad opened his mouth and shrieked like an angry cat.

Haru set him on the bed and made for the armoire, swiftly dressing himself in his sleeping chemise as Milad began to whimper again. He returned to the baby at once, tugging down the hem of his tunic, and lifted Milad into his lap. Ten minutes passed, but Milad did not cease his crying. He refused every food that Haru tempted him with and writhed in the prince’s grip, leaving his guardian at an utter loss.

Haru had risen to draw Milad a bath when his door opened and Makoto came in, rubbing drowsily at his eyes.

“Is he unwell?” frowned the Qasrian, watching Milad beat his small fists upon Haru’s chest. “He has never cried so before.”

“He is missing his mother, and the fault was mine. I went to put him back to bed too soon,” sighed Haru, pushing his hair out of his eyes. “I am sorry he woke you. Perhaps a bath will calm him.”

Makoto shook his head and took Milad from Haru’s arms, holding him tightly to the front of his robes as he walked briskly about the room. Just as before, the crying quieted, and Makoto handed him back with a soft smile.

“Oftentimes, little ones sense their mothers’ worry,” explained the elder lad, “You were fretting terribly when I came in, and oftentimes all that is needed is a cool hand and a calm heart to soothe them.”

Haru sent him a half-hearted glare and took Milad to the cot again, only to stop a second time as the child resumed his crying with a vengeance. “Perhaps it is the crib,” said the Iwatobian with a frown. He settled Milad into the bed once more, with his weary caretakers sitting on either side like a pair of teetering ninepins. At long last, Milad drifted off to byelow, the hem of a sleeping tunic clutched in one hand and the skirt of a crumpled robe in the other.

“He missed you,” whispered Haru, realizing at last what the child had wanted. “He wished to sleep beside us both.”

“Then I shall not deny him, for I hate to see him weep so,” murmured Makoto, his hands drifting to the baby’s cheeks and brushing away the last of his tears. The prince unlaced his overgown and left it on the pillow, hurrying off to his own room to don a sleeping tunic. He reappeared in Haru’s chamber hardly a minute later, coaxing his day robe from Milad’s little fingers and tucking himself into bed beside him. Haru was already asleep opposite him, his black hair hanging limply over his cheek while Milad snored against his guardian’s chest.

Makoto allowed his hand to stray to his friend’s temple, tucking the damp lock behind Haru’s ear. He did not stir for a moment, wondering what it was that had made the Iwatobian so swiftly dear to him, at least as dear as the friends he was brought up alongside—as dear as Gou and Rin, as dear as the cheerful Nagisa and the irrepressible Mikoshibas….

How odd it was, then, that memory after memory fell upon him at the thought of Haru, Haru whose name Makoto had never heard until the emissary from Iwatobi delivered that fateful plea for aid at his parents’ feet. The recollections washed over Makoto in droves, of Haru lying pale and still under a fleet of floating roses, Haru clinging desperately to the reins of a camel while Rei fought laughter beside him, Haru adorned in turquoise and silver and peacock feathers, dancing at the welcoming feast like a breath of summer rain.

Once begun, they would not cease, and as Makoto lay back upon the sateen pillow the thousand cherished images he held of his friend flickered before his eyes. Haru kneeling in the throne room with Makoto’s mother studying his palm, Haru changed in an instant the moment he set eyes upon Milad, Haru fretting like an anxious mother as Milad received his first bath at the prince’s trembling hands, Haru buried to the shoulders in letters of state and betrothal gifts, sinking to the hearthrug in despair. Haru’s joyful gaze bound with his own, brimming with glee as Sakura and Rin plighted their troth by Nagisa’s sickbed, Haru’s face relaxed into the loosened lines of sleep—the sight upon which Makoto closed his eyes and the one upon which he opened them.

They went on and on, treasured glimpses of beauty and worry and weariness and joy, and at last the Qasrian could bear it no longer. He freed his chemise from Milad’s little hand and stumbled to the looking glass, fumbling for the dying candle that stood beside it. It was dying where it stood, little more than a sinking lump of wax remaining in the holder. Makoto opened the chest of drawers and dug through it until his shaking fingers closed upon a fresh stick of bayberry tallow. He lit it on the sputtering wick, pressing the smooth green wax into melted yellow, before raising the light to look upon his face in the mirror.

At first, he saw nothing amiss—nothing but the tired lines below his eyelashes and the frightened turn of his mouth. But at last he lifted his eyes to meet those of his reflection and faced the truth, a truth flung at his head with the softness of a thunderclap. Or perhaps he had always known it, but gently pushed the thought away, not even daring to admit what was in his heart.

For Makoto had seen it himself, how upon looking into the glass his eyes had strayed at once to the side where Haru’s sleeping figure was mirrored on the silver with Milad cradled to his breast.

Surely Haru did not feel the same, he thought, blowing out the candle and returning to the bed on halting feet. His eyes had been veiled for but a moment when he heard the whisper of a scarred palm trailing over the silken coverlet, determined as steel in its path until it closed upon his own. His breath caught in his throat and he looked to the place where his hand and Haru’s lay joined upon the sheet. He made to draw his away, but the pallid fingers clenched upon his with such ferocity that he looked at Haru in astonishment.

He was awake, cobalt eyes blinking fiercely up at his friend’s startled green, a fire flickering within them that stilled Makoto as easily as a blade pressed to his back.

“Haru?” Makoto whispered. “Are you well?”

The Iwatobian nodded, the flame dying as if at the touch of a woodland stream. “You are not, I think.”

“Nay,” breathed Makoto, shutting his eyes and turning his face into the pillow. “I am not.”

“Why?”

Makoto dared to open his eyes, finding nothing but concern on Haru’s face. There was not an inkling of the torment that had broken upon him, no look of a man whose very heart had been shaken to its root.

A shuddering breath escaped his lips, and he shook his head. “I could not sleep, that is all.”

Haru nodded, seemingly near to returning to slumber himself. “I have syrup of aloe and violets in the nightstand.”

Makoto found the little vial and pried out the stopper. It smelt like the draughts his mother had made for him when he was a child, and he let the comforting fragrance linger on his tongue for a moment before he drank. The heaviness stole over his limbs almost at once, and he sank back beside Milad as if felled by an axe. The room faded into blackness as deep as midnight, and the merciful sleep that followed was unbroken by troubled dreams.

*    *    *

“ _Haru!_ ” Kazumi and Kaguya had scarcely dismounted their horses when Haru flew over the tile toward them and into his mother’s arms. She sobbed and strained him to her heart as her sister-in-law’s warm embrace enfolded them both, the elder woman’s tears raining softly onto her nephew’s hair.

At last they broke apart, and Kazumi held her son by the shoulders after dashing the water from her eyes.

“You look well, my son,” she said, finding to her astonishment that Haru seemed to have grown near to half-an-inch in his absence. “What have they been giving you to eat?”

“Platefuls of mackerel at every meal,” laughed the prince, and the ladies exchanged astonished looks at the sound. Haru was rarely heard to laugh, and Kazumi had not been familiar with the music of her son’s voice since his childhood. “After all, we have it fresh here, and Makoto always has his advisor bring some for luncheon. Come, Mother! I must introduce you to him.”

He took the princess’s arm and beckoned the queen into the entrance hall, hurrying the pair along the corridor with several ladies-in-waiting at their heels.

“Where is father?” asked Haru suddenly, noting that the eldest prince of Iwatobi was nowhere to be seen.

“He was unable to come, my lad,” said Kaguya. “Your uncle has been spending more time with Aki of late, and Tamotsu has had to take his place in court for a time.”

Haru sighed, but said nothing, for they had arrived at the throne room. The guards made a full bow to the two ladies, pressing their foreheads to the floor as they would do before their own mistress. After rising, they opened the doors and allowed Haru’s aunt and mother to proceed to the twin chairs at the dais, where Natsuko sat alone, arrayed in a glittering robe in orange and rose. She rose as they drew near, and with a laugh Natsuko threw her arms about the visiting princess and queen.

“How long we have been awaiting you,” she said as she let them go, joy seeming to shimmer in her every nerve. “I have wished to meet you for so many years, Kazumi! For you did not visit when your brother-in-law journeyed here twenty years ago.”

“I am sorry, Natsuko,” said Haru’s mother, bowing her head briefly to the empress. “But it was but shortly before Haru was born, as you recall.”

“Indeed, indeed,” nodded Natsuko. She beckoned to her son, who rose from his place by the east wall and bowed to the visitors in the Iwatobian fashion, one knee upon the ground and right hand over his breast. Kazumi smiled as she raised him to his feet, and Kaguya looked to Natsuko in astonishment.

“This tall lad?” she said in bewilderment. “He was no higher than my knee when I met him last!”

Makoto laughed sheepishly and rubbed at his neck. “Nobody is quite sure how I grew so, for I stand half a head higher than Father.”

“Haru has grown since he came,” said Natsuko cheerily. “Perhaps it is all the fish he bolts at supper. Now run away, my lads, and send the small ones in to greet us.”

The princes bowed to the three women and departed the chamber, chattering excitedly as they ran down to the grounds, where the goods tied onto the backs of the camels were being taken down by an army of attendants. Haru recognized small Kashi in the crowd, who shrieked a greeting as his father helped him down from his steed.

“Prince Haruka!” he cried, running to the elder boy’s side and winding his arms about his waist. “Aki sent me this, for you.”

“What did he send?” asked the amused prince, as the child clung tightly to his robe.

“ _This_ ,” insisted Kashi, butting his head into Haru’s stomach before jumping up to bestow a kiss on his cheek. “And that, as well. He misses you dearly.”

Haru’s throat tightened, and he snatched up the little lad in a hug, swinging him by the arms until his feet left the ground. Kashi shouted with joy as Makoto laughed, and at last Haru grew dizzy and set him down again.

“Do your best to give him mine in return,” chuckled Haru, peppering kisses onto the crown of the boy’s head as he wriggled in the prince’s arms. “Every last one, until he turns as red as an apple and Jun has to douse him with a bucket.”

At last, the giggling child freed himself from Haru’s grasp and swarmed up Makoto’s back like a squirrel.

“Hullo,” he chirped, squirming until he had seated himself upon the Qasrian’s shoulders and fixing the man with an eager look. “Who are you, then?”

“ _Kashi,_ ” cried Haru, attempting to smother his laughter in his sleeve. “ _Down._ That is Makoto, crown prince of Qasr.”

“ _Kashi!_ ” came a roar from behind them. The two princes turned to see a bearded man come storming up the steps, having freed his bags at last from his contrary camel. “I leave you but for a moment, and you run off to trouble your liege! I am sorry, Highness,” he panted, bowing low before the prince. “Kashi! Climb down at once, and make your apologies to his lordship!”

“Shan’t,” sang Kashi, putting his small hands over Makoto’s eyes. “Can you stand on one foot with your eyes shut, Prince Makoto?”

The man purpled at the name, and Haru drew back into alarm as his hands rose into fists. “ _If your mother had accompanied us_ —forgive him, your Majesty, he is but a foolish child—”

Makoto laughed, peeping out from behind Kashi’s fingers. “I am the elder brother to twins no older than he, good sir. I have woken to find all my blankets stripped from the bed in the dead of winter and three children making tents with them by the hearth.”

“Father, settle,” came the amused voice of a young woman who took the steps two at a time toward them. “Prince Haruka,” she said, making him a curtsey before repeating the gesture to Makoto. “ _Kashi_ ,” she hissed, in a voice that bit like iron.

Kashi slid obediently to the ground and took his sister’s hand, permitting himself to be dragged away to the rest of the Iwatobian party. “I shall see you at the feast to-morrow!” he cried, waving at Haru. “And you, Prince Makoto!”

“You will be lucky if Father lets you sit up for the dinner,” said his sister drily, handing him a neat parcel of meat pies for his supper. “Now hush and eat, else I will slip you a posset before the evening.”

Kashi’s shrieks of protest faded into the distance as the princes went back into the palace, finding Hayato and the twins by the dancing-halls and directing them to the throne room.

“Shall we see how Nagisa and the others are getting on?” asked Makoto, hovering by the door. Haru nodded, taking Makoto’s hand and pulling him into the great practice-hall, where all of the dancers were rehearsing in costume.

They were half-way through the performance, and Rei was nowhere to be seen on the stage. He was sitting on the floor in a corner with Malka and Momo, laughing over a game of cards, while Sakura and Nagisa danced together on the dais to the trembling song of the flutes, for the musicians had been called in to practice as well. Sakura’s costume—one of the many she would wear for the night, all of them drawn by Rei—was hued in the colors of gold and red wine, a half-robe falling to her knees with deep yellow dancing trousers beneath, and narrow sleeves bound thinly upon her shoulders and arching down like a mountain spring before clasping at her wrists beside a pair of bangles. A narrow circlet was set upon her brow, with a single desert blossom in golden filigree winking on either side.

“My, it is even lovelier upon her than in Rei’s sketches,” breathed Makoto. “He did beautifully.”

Haru nodded proudly, pointing to the steward himself. “His robe is one of the finest.”

Rei rose at that moment to fetch Malka a drink of water, and the princes looked in wonder upon the fluttering yards of midnight-blue silk, covered with delicate stitching in violet and polished silver. Rei’s jewels were silver as well, a slender band studded with crystal curving across his forehead like a snake gilded in moonlight. Crystal bedecked his wrists and feet as well, throwing back rainbows of color when the lamplight fell upon them.

“The very picture of a man of the heavens,” said Haru, watching as Momo left his seat and joined Lili on the floor, dancing opposite her as she leapt about Sakura with a pair of satin ribbons. “Tomorrow shall truly be a spectacle of the ages.”

Makoto inclined his head and with that they returned to the royal wing, eager for a well-deserved rest.

*    *    *

On the morning of the betrothal feast, Haru woke to an empty bed.

Makoto had not slept in his chambers the previous night, for Milad had missed his afternoon slumber and was far too drowsy by evening to mind the elder prince’s absence in the chamber. He had not even fussed when Haru put him into his cot while he bathed, and upon emerging from the washroom the Iwatobian found him fast asleep upon his little blanket, holding the doll that Ren had made for him. Makoto had laughed at the sight when he arrived after supper, and then bid Haru farewell and departed for his own room for the first night since Milad’s arrival.

Haru had not slept alone for close to a month, and as he raised his eyelids and looked drearily at the velvet canopy, he decided that he disliked it immensely. His arms felt terribly empty without the small, soft warmth of the child grasping at his chemise, and the hand that usually took Makoto’s while they rested ached to the knuckles. Milad had not woken through the night, and he lay contentedly in the crib, still holding Ren’s poppet to his chest.

The prince rose from the bed and went to the washroom, combing his hair before the glass and essaying to line his eyes with kohl alone, for Rei was sleeping on the first level with the other dancers. He had just dashed the third attempt from his lashes when a soft knock sounded at the connecting door, and Haru fled out to the sitting room with black paint smudged onto the bridge of his nose to answer it.

It was Makoto, already dressed for the day in a simple plum-coloured robe, similar in its length and cut to Haru’s own. He laughed at the sight that met him, and Haru glared as fiercely as he could. Makoto only smiled again, for he reminded the Qasrian of a kitten he had tried to bathe as a child.

His friend’s own kohl was impeccably drawn, the ends sweeping up into a pair of slender wings at the corners of his eyes. He looked at the stray drops on Haru’s eyebrows and chuckled, shooing the younger lad back into the washroom and wetting a cloth before cleaning the paint from Haru’s face.

“You ought to have asked me,” chided Makoto, as Haru closed his eyes expectantly for the brush. It touched his skin as gently as a feather, the stroke far gentler than the purposeful arcs Rei was given to drawing, and done in an instant. When Haru lifted his eyelids and gazed at the mirror, he found his cobalt gaze lined perfectly, in a thicker curve of color than the Iwatobian had ever worn before. “How is it, then?”

“Well enough,” said Haru, turning his head from left to right to measure the evenness of Makoto’s work. “Thank you.”

Makoto shook his head fondly. “Milad is still asleep, then? He did not wake his dear father at an unholy hour upon finding himself in the cot?”

Haru rolled his eyes. “If he had done so, it should have been your own fault for leaving us alone last night. But nay, our son was as sweet-tempered as you, and I should have slept easily had the both of you been beside me.”

And with that he blew cheerfully out of the chamber, tucking Milad under his arm and going to the next apartment to see that the twins readied themselves on time. Makoto was left alone in the washroom, as silent and still as a statue, gazing open-mouthed at the door through which his friend had vanished.

When Haru returned half-an-hour later, having dressed Ran’s hair and helped Ren and Hayato with their baths, he found Makoto sitting on his bed, looking despondently across at the looking-glass.

“Makoto?” he asked.

“Ah, Haru,” said Makoto, offering a soft smile as Milad babbled and reached for his arms. Haru surrendered the child and went to sit beside his friend.

“You see Milad as more than a ward, do you not?” Makoto asked, blowing bubbling breaths into the baby’s stomach and chuckling as he shrieked with laughter.

“I do not think I can call him ‘ward’ any longer, in truth,” confessed the prince, throwing himself across the foot of the bed. “And—-well, there is the matter of what is to be done about him.”

“Done about him?” Makoto sent him a puzzled look before his eyes widened in horror. “You cannot mean to leave him here when you return to Iwatobi!”

“Nay! Never that, Makoto. I—I meant you.”

“What of me?” he inquired.

“Makoto, don’t be a fool. You know Milad loves you as dearly as he loves me.”

The Qasrian’s heart swelled at his friend’s words, only to be dashed when Haru spoke again.

“I am due to depart in less than two moons.”

“He will grow used to my absence in time,” reasoned Makoto. “And you will return next year, and after that—”

“Would you permit me to remain in Qasr for longer?” asked Haru, his eyes shut as he clenched his fingers in his lap. “I would rather not part him from you until I must.”

“ _Anything,_ Haru,” said Makoto, taking the rigid hands into his own and pressing them until the hard lines of muscle and bone loosened into stillness. “For as long as you wish. But what will your family say?”

“Not a word, if I wish to remain.” Haru lifted his shoulders carelessly. “I will miss Aki, to be sure, but he is to be a husband soon, and he cannot spend all his days with his cousin as he used to do.”

“But your parents—”

“I don’t wish to be parted from you, either.”

Makoto’s jaw dropped, and he looked up at his friend to find an odd look in his eyes—a look as soft as almond blossoms, clear as a stain of wine on ivory cloth.

“Then you shall stay.”

“Dress Milad, and then we can break our fast,” Haru ordered, before frowning and setting his hands on his hips. “I had not thought of it earlier,” he muttered. “Rei is gone, and I have no manservant. I will have to ready myself for the betrothal ceremony in an hour.”

“I can assist you,” said Makoto. “After all, I have never had an attendant.”

Haru nodded and made for the cupboard, drawing out the paper parcel that held his blue and golden robe. He tore it open and laid the gown upon the bed, looking in bewilderment at the intricate lacing at the bodice. Makoto shook his head and cast a practiced eye over the garment, loosening the velvet strings and marking the paired eyelets with his fingers.

“It will be easy to do,” he announced. “Put on your jewels first, and then we can see to the robe.”

The Iwatobian unlocked his jewel-case and made for his signet ring, which he slipped onto the first finger of his right hand, leaving the third bare for the betrothal ring that would be placed upon it later that day. His childhood ring--one of a matching pair, the twin of which belonged to Aki--went upon the last finger of the left hand, for the others were too large for it.

His hair was neatly combed, and so he took the long ear-rings from their box and put them on. A simple circlet of gold went through either lobe, but from each slender hoop there hung a wealth of chains--chains of lilies no bigger than a droplet of water, every blossom ablaze with a winking sapphire at its heart. Makoto caught sight of his friend’s reflection in the glass and narrowed his eyes at the jewels.

“That….that is a near match for my own ring,” he said. “Have you one to wear with these?”

“Nay, I wear only my seal and this one that Aki gifted to me,” said Haru distractedly, disentangling the matching necklace from a strand of inky fireglass. “Clasp this for me, will you? I fear I have left the bracelets with Rei’s things, and I do not know where he keeps his key.” He returned his attention to the jewel-case and searched among the pieces until he found two stacks of thin bangles, which he slid onto each arm until he shone from wrist to elbow with gold. He wore nothing upon his feet, for his robes were long, and once they had finished with the ornaments Makoto laced him into the gown.

“Is it suitable for Qasr?” said Haru wryly, rising to his feet and promptly stumbling over the train.

“The cut is of your own homeland, and the embroidery,” noted Makoto, fastening the forehead-piece into the hair over Haru’s brow and clasping the chains behind. “And here you stand for Iwatobi, so you are without flaw to-night--or you shall be, once I return.” The Qasrian sprang away and darted through the connecting door, vanishing into his own chambers. He returned a moment later, bearing a small tray and a soft sheepskin brush that glinted in the dusty beams slanting down from the high windows.

“What have you there?” asked Haru, resuming his place before the glass. Makoto pressed the catch on the tray and worked the lid free of the basin, revealing a shallow dish half-filled with a sparkling powder.

Haru glanced at the little bowl and burst into laughter.

“Let me put it on, and you will look every inch a king,” Makoto ordered. “Stop your laughing. It is costly, and I do not wear it more than thrice a year.”

The Iwatobian shut his eyes as the soft brush crossed the apples of his cheeks and then the shadows below his brows. Once Makoto’s hand was drawn away, he dared to glance at himself and found himself pleasantly surprised by his reflection, for his skin had darkened in hue since his arrival in Qasr and set off the powdered gold magnificently against the deep-blue gleam of the sapphires.

He seemed older, he thought--both like and unlike the second prince of Iwatobi who had spent his life in Aki’s sunny shadow. Gone was the sulking turn of his lip and the frown that lingered between his eyes, and the lost look of half-lidded eyes that mirrored a soul both loved and lonesome. The corners of his mouth were turned up in a faint smile, and the cobalt gaze was wider than it had been of old and filled with childish eagerness for the evening.

Haru paid no mind to the gold glittering on his forehead and along his jaw, nor to the heavy jewels burning like fire about his neck and arms. He had always known himself to be beautiful, but for the first time he found the beauty of his body mirrored in his heart. Makoto had given it to him, Makoto and Milad, and before he knew it he had leapt from the stool and embraced his friend, scattering grains of starry dust over the Qasrian’s shoulder as he wrapped his arms about the elder prince’s waist.

“Thank you,” he whispered, his words smothered by Makoto’s linen robe.

Makoto tightened his hold and drew Haru close to his heart.

“Always, Haru.”

*    *    *

“Oh, _where_ have my laces gone—”

“Pailan, your clasps have come loose.”

“ _Momotarou Mikoshiba!_ Let go of my slippers at once!”

Rei shook his head at the hubbub about him and swarmed up the ladder to the lofts, perching himself by the railing and looking down at the bedlam below in contentment. He laughed as Sakura wrested her slippers from Momo’s hands and brought them down on his head for good measure before falling onto a cushion, swatting blindly at her brother when he poked at her neck with a loose feather that had fallen from his robe. Malka was sewing an eye back onto her gown, cursing under her breath as she drew her needle through the cloth. Nagisa was darting in and out among the others, lacing his comrades into their costumes and searching for fresh pairs of slippers as he flew from one wall of the chamber to the next. Rei felt his heart inexplicably warmed at the sight, and settled his chin upon the balustrade to watch as Sakura threw off her heavy mantle, bringing her robe of wine-colored and golden silk to the light.

Every inch of it shimmered, for the tailors had stitched glittering gold beads against the scarlet silk and Sakura had stolen a pot of powdered gold from Makoto’s chambers, brushing it over her neck and arms and even upon her gown. She shone like a sunlit cloud under the shaded glow of the lanterns, and Rei smiled as he thought of Nagisa’s hope to see _Dahab-E-Noor_ danced again—and of how beautifully that hope had come to fruit.

“Will we be able to attend the ceremony?” asked Malka, tying off the last thread and turning to Lili. “It’s before the supper, isn’t it?”

“I shall be going,” said Nagisa, drawing a cloak over his gown as he got to his feet. “And you, Rei?”

“Of course,” answered Rei. “I will have to be with Haru at the entry, and my seal is required upon the betrothal papers.”

Nagisa nodded, calling round at the others to see if they would go as well. Rei had already dressed in his robe for the occasion—Aki’s cream-coloured brocade, elegant and unassuming beside Nagisa’s gown of poison green.

Rei and Nagisa departed with only Sakura and Momo at their heels, for none of the others had wished to join the feast. Sakura was fidgeting with her betrothal ring, and Momo eyed her curiously as he slipped his arm through his sister’s. She had clad herself in the mantle again, a heavy garment of blue velvet that shrouded her from throat to ankles.

“Nee-chan?”

“They will not marry, you know.”

“Who?” asked Rei, turning to Sakura in bewilderment, thinking for a moment that she was speaking of Rin.

But she did not answer him, shaking her head and brushing quickly by with the astonished Momo clinging to her wrist. A moment more and they had disappeared, leaving Nagisa and Rei to follow at a slower pace.

When they reached the feasting hall, the dancer bid Rei farewell as he went to sit by the Mikoshibas, and Rei made his way to the garlanded chairs at the dais where Ren sat alone, dressed in a white tunic and a pair of fitted breeches. The little lad wore a pensive look as he gazed into the flames dancing upon the altar, and Rei followed the glance to find that the dishes of fire burned emerald and violet with powders of bluestone and saltpeter.

“It is a fair trick, that,” he said, watching as Ren filled another bowl half-way with grain and lit a knot of laurelwax, dropping it into the dish of lentils as it burst into flower. The sharp, sweet fragrance curled into the air like steam, and the boy paused to brush his fingers through the fiery petals before pouring a spoonful of dried balm over the flames, which snapped for an instant before paling to white.

“White, violet, and green, for the colors of Qasr,” explained Ren, stoppering the jar of balm and tucking it into a sachet.

“Green for the Qasrian willow, violet for the Qasrian fig, and white for the foam of the sea,” murmured Rei, who had studied the crests and colors of the surrounding kingdoms as a boy. Ren beamed, nodding at the great bowl of leaves and flowers to his right.

“Now you must make a string of leaves for me, and I shall weave you a necklace of flowers” said the child.

“The first rites are ours, then?” he asked, plucking a handful of leaves and accepting a needle and thread from the little prince. He pierced the stems of mint and ash and aspen, working quickly while small Ren passed the needle carefully through the hearts of blushing mayflowers.

“The younger brothers and sisters of the bride and bridegroom must welcome each other first,” explained Ren, choosing a small rose-bud for his wreath. “For we will be family after tonight, and I shall call you _nii-chan._ ”

“Nobody has ever called me so,” said Rei, smiling as he recalled Aki’s horror-stricken face when the little steward had tried to address him by the honorific.

“Oh, there they come!” whispered Ren, tugging at Rei’s sash as he turned to look down the hall. Rei glanced up from his finished garland to see Haru making his way between the rows of satin cushions, cobalt eyes lined in heavy wings of kohl and shimmering about the corners with gold. He was both like and unlike the careless prince of by-gone days, both simpler and fairer, content and melancholy at once. Makoto stood at his left, to signify that the family of the future bride approved of the coming marriage, and an Iwatobian guard flanked Haru at his right, having shed his fluid armor in measure of the bridegroom’s faith in his father-in-law’s household.

Ran approached with her mother from the east end of the chamber, wrapped in a fluttering green gown embroidered from neck to hem with Qasrian willows. She already wore a silver band upon her brow--to be shed and replaced by a coronet of flowers during the ceremony--and in her hands she held a jewel-case for Haru’s betrothal gift. The Iwatobian attendant held the tokens for Ran, and before another minute had passed Haru was seated at Rei’s left hand while Ran sat across from him. The king took his place before them; Rei and Ren exchanged their wreaths, and the betrothal rites began.

Rei had never an occasion to attend a betrothal in Iwatobi until Aki’s, and once he had performed his duty he watched in silence as Haru and Ran poured offerings of grain and coins into the colored fires, joined hands, and crowned their left fourth fingers with a pair of gleaming rings. Ran’s was small and slender, beautifully chased with Haru’s royal seal and set with fiery rubies. Haru’s shone with lapis deeper in hue than his eyes. The newly-promised pair sat quietly as Masoto read them their vows, and they were repeated once in the sharp, clear tones of the Iwatobian language, once in the windy music of the Qasrian tongue, and again in the common speech so that all the visiting congregation might understand what had been said.

The manservant listened as the words of one kingdom curled about the words of the other, hearing them thrice as they were spoken; like Haru, he had studied the speech of the surrounding lands as a child, and the sweetness of Ran’s lilting voice was as plain to him as the hurried pace of his own tongue.

_All the right of my House is thine._

_All the right of my Wealth is thine._

_All the right of my Blood is thine._

_All the right of my Name is thine._

_All the right of my Hand is thine._

_All the right of my Heart is thine._

Rei saw that Makoto was murmuring the words as well, so quietly that not even Hayato could not hear from his place by the prince’s feet. The steward found himself reciting the vows under his own breath, for they hung heavy on the air as they left Haru’s lips. This wedding would be much greater than a handfasting between a lord and a lady--for it was a wedding of two peoples, Qasr and Iwatobi bound through the ages by Ran’s careful speech and Haru’s swifter promises, two who could hardly hope to know the weight of their utterance.

Then the betrothal gifts were exchanged, and Haru made much of the pearls Ran gave to him, knotting them into his girdle so that they glistened like a cloudy nimbus round his waist. The officials of the court nodded their approval, and at last the party broke for supper. The performance was due to commence soon after the meal began, and Rei made his excuses to the queen before making his way through the chattering crowd to Nagisa.

“Are you ready?” asked the dancer, taking his hand as they followed Sakura and Momo out through a side-door by the tables of food and drink on the west wall of the chamber.

Rei nodded, making swift work of unlacing his overgown so that he should be ready to don his dancing-robe upon returning to the common room. Nagisa said nothing more, for he had let go of Rei’s wrist and gone ahead with Momo, leaving the steward to follow with Sakura. She seemed to tremble with excitement, the gold on her slender neck sparking like flame in the torchlight, and the gaze she turned upon the steward seemed to have been thrown from Heaven itself--fierce as fire and bright as the stars, and Rei saw anew Nagisa’s wisdom in naming her for the title role.

“Come, Noor,” he laughed, lifting the skirts of his gown as he ran after Momo. “We shall be late.”

They found the dancers chattering in the dressing-room, all of them clad in their shimmering costumes and several adorned from throat to ankles with jewels. Nagisa shed his feasting robe and donned a simple yellow tunic, for Amal was a man of the earth, and Rei had drawn his every garment to stand alien to Sakura’s. Momo and Malka were dressed in matching gowns of pink silk, for they were to play a pair of students that traveled with Dahab-E-Noor as her apprentices.

Sakura, having dressed herself before the betrothal ceremony, flung off her mantle and left it to tangle with Momo’s practice-breeches on the tile, while Lili led Rei to a chair and opened a jar of silver paint, brushing lines of the stuff into his shadowy hair. Rei studied himself in the glass, watching as Lili and Nagisa transformed him into a god between them. His arms and brow shone with crystal, mirrored in the glittering stitches upon the filmy silk of his robe. Nagisa dabbed another smearing of paint onto his mouth and the apples of his cheeks, and when Rei lifted his eyes to his reflection again it was as if a king of the fae sat before him, every line of his body aglow with the watered light of the stars.

“There, my lord,” jested Lili, offering the steward a hand as he got to his feet. “Our work is lovely, is it not?”

“Nay, he is the one who is lovely,” Nagisa countered, laughing as the elder boy’s cheeks turned from silver to rose. “A very prince of the heavens, whether he be adorned with moonbeams or not.”

“How long until we must leave?” asked the flushing manservant, turning his head this way and that as Lili secured his spectacles behind his head by a stout length of string.

“Not more than five minutes,” said Lili, shooing him away from the glass as she went to put on her ornaments. “Go sit by the doors.”

Rei went as bidden, sitting beside Nagisa as the younger lad kicked his heels at the marble floor.

“What is it?” asked the Iwatobian, noting the dancer’s knuckles clenched upon the hem of his tunic.

“I cannot wait to dance this tale,” breathed Nagisa, turning to Rei and gripping his friend’s slender fingers with small, rough ones.

“Neither can I,” smiled Rei, pressing the proffered hand in his turn. The soft sound of a gong rang at the other end of the corridor that led to the feasting hall, and as one Nagisa and Rei rose to their feet, followed by the other dancers.

Nagisa looked up at Rei, five weeks’ worth of sweat and preparations and trembling joy shining in his eyes. Their tangled hands did not draw away from one another, and as the gong sounded again Rei slipped his feet into satin shoes and let Nagisa lead him forth into the light.

*    *    *

 _Flight,_ he thought.

Rei had often seen dancers at their craft in Iwatobi, long before Haru’s betrothal to Ran had ever been thought of. He was recalled to a wedding he had served at many years ago as he watched Sakura dance her opening piece, her sunset mane of hair snapping at her back like a bonfire, her amber eyes glowing under the lamps like half-forgotten embers rising to life from a bed of ashes. The steward felt the breath plucked from his chest as she circled about the stage, at last making as if her labors had left her weary before she laid herself upon the tile, letting her magnificent head droop like a slumbering flower onto her arms as her limbs fell like water into the loosened lines of sleep.

He tossed his head before he danced out onto the dais, leaping with the grace of a flighty doe as he moved from the west wall to the east, the gentle god observing the beauty sleeping before him as he shimmered like the silvery face of the harvest moon. Silken strains of melody billowed from his lips--strains that were his own, penned a month before as he strove to give Nagisa the glorious spectacle his heart desired.

Before he knew it his time upon the stage had half-drawn to a close, and he drew close to Sakura and stooped to brush her cheek, carelessly jostling the horn of ambrosia he bore at his elbow so that it let fall its bounty about the slumbering girl. Her hand rose as if she had been woken from a dream, coming to rest upon his own as the spirit felt the blow of the wound he had dealt himself in his folly.

A moment later Rei made his departure, retreating behind the curtains where a young man and woman stood in royal garb, having a part as the king and queen before whom Dahab-E-Noor would dance the performance that brought her to renown throughout her country. As he brushed aside the heavy bolt of velvet, they slipped past him to take their places on the dais, and Rei found himself nose-to-nose with Nagisa as he stood by Malka and Lili, waiting for the refrain that would announce his entry.

“You were beautiful, Rei,” whispered the dancer, his russet eyes wet with tears. “Your craft is the loveliest thing that I have ever looked upon.”

“It would have come to nothing without your dancing, and your heart,” murmured Rei, a smile quirking at the corners of his lips. “It was not I who charted every caper and worked my feet and fingers to the bone teaching a troupe of fifty their roles.”

“You will watch me, will you not?” asked Nagisa, looking on as the king and queen rushed back into the corridor to change their gowns and Malka and Lili cantered out to the performance hall with coral dancing-ribbons fluttering about their knees.

“Always.” answered Rei. “I have watched you since our preparations began, and I do not see why this night should be different.”

Nagisa nodded, and his eyes were suddenly hidden by a veil of long, golden lashes. Rei lifted an arching brow and grasped his friend’s trembling hands.

“It will go on as well as it has begun,” he said firmly, prodding at the quivering palms until the russet gaze met violet once more. “You have my word.”

“I know,” replied Nagisa, a laugh bubbling like midsummer cordial in his voice. “I do not think there is room in my heart for anything but joy, to-night.”

“Nor in mine,” admitted the other, turning away for an instant as Momo whisked aside the curtain and vanished into the hall. He glanced back in question as Nagisa tugged at his sleeve. “What is it?”

A soft, luminous look had stolen into the dancer’s eyes, seeming almost to cast a shadow upon his face. His hands tightened upon Rei’s, and when he spoke his voice was lower than the tenderest of prayers.

“Thank you, Rei.”

Rei drew a breath for his reply, but before the words were half-formed a kiss had been set upon his silvered lips, brushing his mouth like the cloudy petals of a fallen flower. He had scarcely an instant to wonder before he returned it, and when they drew apart he knew that the endearments that would have passed between them had been sung in the embrace a thousand times over, brow meeting brow and palm meeting palm as a ripple of joy flowed into their cheeks like a river finding the slumbering sea.

“It’s nearly time for my entry,” murmured Nagisa, as Malka emerged into the corridor.

“Were we not dancing before the queen, I should have asked you to let it be and remain at my side,” confessed the steward, finding to his astonishment that a sob had risen in his throat.

“And were we not dancing before the queen, I could not have hoped to refuse you,” answered Nagisa. He did not move to lift the curtain until the trilling of the pipes beyond it died away, and when the harps took up the strain he squared his shoulders and fluttered onto the dais like a crane, looking as if the music quavering in his ears lived in his very flesh, quickening his blood like a heavenly draught of netted starlight.

Rei fell onto a cushion beside Lili, for at once he felt as if his knees would no longer hold his weight. As he shut his eyes and let his head droop to his knees, he heard the sound of poorly muffled laughter brimming from the place at his right. He turned and saw Malka stuffing a kerchief into her mouth and Lili pinching at her nose in vain, for the latter had glimpsed the exchange between the lads and relayed it to her gleeful comrade the moment she returned to the alcove.

“Not a word,” he warned, flushing scarlet as his friends cackled into their heavy sleeves.

*    *    *

“She is lovely,” breathed Rin, clasping his hands upon his knees as he gazed up at the dais, which burned like the dawn in the torchlight. Sakura was dancing upon a little parapet constructed of lath and nails, clad in a gown of gold and red while Nagisa watched from below, a love-lorn look upon his face.

Seijurou’s mouth twitched as he smothered a smile, exchanging a knowing glance with Gou as she sat by his side. He found to his surprise that her eyes rested upon Nagisa rather than on Sakura or Rin, and as he waited her lips rose in a mischievous grin.

“What is it?” he asked.

“You have watched them at practice before, have you not?” she asked, gesturing to the golden-haired dancer as he rose to mirror Sakura’s steps across the floor.

“Indeed, I have,” Sei replied. “What of it.”

“Look at Nagisa.”

Seijurou followed his wife’s finger to their excitable friend as he circled about the stage, his arms arching up in Sakura’s direction as hers dipped toward the ground. The general saw at once what Gou had meant, and he turned to her in bewilderment.

“What does it mean?”

When Nagisa danced, he measured grace turn for turn with care, his eyes sweeping the dais as he watched his comrades at their work. But the careful eyes were half-lidded before them, the movements left purely to memory. The lad seemed to be calling out with the motions of every slender limb, blind to the swaying of Lili and Momo behind him, and the breathless beauty of his act was one that neither Seijurou nor Gou had glimpsed before.

“ _Love,_ Sei. Love,” murmured Rin, who had been eavesdropping as Sakura executed the scene of her fall from the balcony. “Or so I would say, had he not been breaking himself upon his dancing slippers for the last fortnight.”

“What?” he sputtered, looking wildly between his wife and brother-in-law. “ _Nagisa?_ In _love?_ With whom?”

“You will know in a moment,” sang Gou, paying no mind to the boys’ petulant frowns as she turned away from the performance.

It was over before they had realized it, Rei returning to the dais for his ending piece to dance opposite Sakura as the maiden and the god plighted their troth upon a plinth of living stars. The lamps were lit again and the rest of the troupe swarmed out of the adjoining chamber, making their bows hand-in-hand to roars of approval from the guests. As they watched, Rei made his way to Nagisa’s side and took the dancer’s hand in his own, lifting it to his lips and kissing it swiftly before vanishing into the crowd. Nagisa disappeared a moment later, leaving Seijurou and Rin thunderstruck where they sat on either side of Gou, and Gou herself shrieking with laughter as she rose to shout her congratulations.

*    *    *

“Well,” murmured Makoto from his place beside Haru at the high table. “It seems that your manservant is no longer without a sweetheart after all.”

Haru nodded.

“I was sure of it, since Rei left my chambers,” he said. He shot Makoto a wicked glance as the Qasrian looked fondly across the chamber at Momo, who had pulled Malka into a gamboling waltz across the dais. “Only you are left, if we aren’t counting Momo.”

Makoto laughed. “Look at the lad, Haru. He and Malka have not said a word upon marriage between them, but it will not be long. Malka is eighteen next year and Momo the year after that, and then we will have a wedding of the ages, knowing Momo’s freedom with his brother’s purse. I shall be the only one unmarried, before long.”

“Not long ago, marriage seemed no closer than death to him,” chuckled Haru. “Rei was certain that he should never be loved with such a bothersome pair of princes at his heels, and perhaps now it is nearer than he thinks.”

“Where would they make their home?” asked Makoto presently. “Rei’s place has been by you and your cousin since his birth, but I cannot imagine Nagisa leaving Qasr, either.”

“We will not depart for two moons, yet,” said the younger lad, resting his chin upon alabaster palms as his eyes lingered upon the place where Rei had stood with the other dancers. “And Rei’s place is no longer mine. We are prince and servant no longer--neither are we child and nursemaid. I am older than he, and this last month is the first in nineteen years that I have felt it. He is more than my keeper, and Nagisa has given him the youth he never knew at home. I shall not stand in their way if he wishes to remain here when I return.”

Makoto hummed his agreement. Before them, the hall had exploded into chatter again, much of it for the grand spectacle of the performance. Couples were leaving their places and leaping up to the dais to dance, and from where they sat they caught a glimpse of Rin whirling about the floor in Sakura’s arms, with Seijurou and Gou giggling at their tail. Momo and Malka had jumped down to the supper-tables, looking hungrily at the great roast boar lying in state between a pair of fat ducks and a dish of sugared fruit. Nagisa and Rei were nowhere to be seen.

“Shall we go back to your chambers?” asked Makoto presently, draining his tumbler of sharbat. “Milad ought to be put to bed before long.”

Haru nodded and finished his own, which tasted of saffron and rosewater. They left the chamber in silence, slipping between the frolicking dancers until they reached the outer hall. Once the doors had fallen shut behind them, Haru took Makoto’s hand in his and made his way to the staircase that led up to the royal wing.

When they arrived at Haru’s apartments, Makoto went to his own room to undress. Haru shut the door behind him and made his way to the bedchamber, where the nursemaid was singing Milad to sleep in an armchair. Haru took his sleeping garments and shed his golden robe in Rei’s room, folding the gown and tucking it into the manservant’s half-empty cupboard. He pulled on the tunic and trousers slowly, his hands fumbling with the laces at his neck as he knotted the clasps together.

Makoto was in his room when he returned, and the maidservant had gone. Milad was babbling cheerfully into the prince’s face, patting his sunburned cheek with his rose-leaf hands while Makoto kissed his little toes, drawing peals of laughter from the baby as he kicked his feet at the Qasrian’s chest. Haru flung himself onto the bed beside Milad, pressing his face into the bolster with a sigh.

“Thank Heaven that is over,” he sighed, closing his eyes as Makoto drew up the covers over his shoulders.

Makoto nodded wearily, grasping Haru’s hand and curling up across from the Iwatobian like a child at rest. “We can have a full night’s slumber again, praise be.”

Haru did not answer, and for a moment Makoto thought that he had gone to sleep where he lay. He turned to the nightstand and blew out the candle before sinking back into the blankets, breathing deeply as Milad’s little fist closed upon his his sleeve. Half a minute later, he felt his hand lifted from its place upon the coverlet, stilling the wind in his chest before his palm was drawn to Haru’s lips to receive a tender kiss. Makoto dared not open his eyes as Haru seemed almost to swallow a sob before pressing his hand to his heart, kissing it once more before letting it fall to the bed again.

He could not have moved had he wished it, not even after nearly an hour had gone by and the ebb and flow of Haru’s breathing had long since lost the measured pace of consciousness. At last he raised his lashes and looked upon the slumbering prince, whose pallid cheeks were lined with the silvery footmarks of hastily smothered tears. Makoto wiped them away as best he could, letting his hand linger for an instant on the sorrowing face.

“It will come right, in the end,” he promised, hardly knowing of what he spoke as Haru stirred in his sleep, drawing closer to Makoto. “I swear it, my darling. Do not cry.”

There was not a witness to the chamber save the waxing Moon, and with his promise Makoto was lost like a song to the quiet prayer of the Qasrian night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Find me on tumblr if you want to chat about the fic, get sneak peeks of upcoming chapters, or do fanart or illustrations! 
> 
>  
> 
> [Godmother To Clarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/)


	7. Sapphire, Ruby, Ruby, Pearl

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a prince and an advisor become better friends, rings are exchanged again, and Sakura nearly sets Rin on fire.

“Rei-chan!” cried Nagisa, running barefoot across the marble floor of the courtyard with an unlit sparkler in hand. “Light this one with a pair of yellow crackers.”

Two hours had passed since the end of the feast, and the heavens were a velvety black above the spires of the citadel. After the performance, the guests had swiftly grown tired of supper and dancing, and one by one they put their plates aside and streamed out of the palace to make merry throughout the gardens. Not long ago, a group of attendants had flocked onto the great terrace with buckets of sparklers, with tubs of water close at hand lest the shrubs be set afire. From the corner of his eye, Rei glimpsed Ran and Hayato by the parapet that looked out upon the town, laughing as they spelt out their names into the night with a pair of Martulian candles, whose sparks trailed well past the end of the iron rod through their hearts. All semblance of a royal gathering had been shed long ago, for even lords and generals and ladies of the court were dashing up and down the paths and pursuing one another with handfuls of lit crackers.

From where he stood with Nagisa by the steps to the gardens below, Rei caught sight of the queen. She sat like a carven effigy upon the balustrade, gazing down upon the glittering fires that burned in the streets beneath them. Her husband was beside her, his weary head drooping upon her shoulder as he steadied her in his arms. Rei’s lips turned up at the picture, and he looked back to Nagisa with the light of the crimson sparklers flickering in his eyes.

“It is almost as if they were born for one another, is it not?” he asked, brushing his violet burning-papers to Nagisa’s firecracker until they burst into flame. He relinquished them at once, watching as they rose like windblown petals into the air, a burning fleet of ships setting sail upon the midnight breeze.

Nagisa offered a half-hearted smile, spinning about so that the sparks showered down about him like gleaming drops of rain. “Aye, it is. But she is unhappy, Rei.”

“The queen?” asked the steward, looking toward the royal pair once again. “What ails her?”

“I do not rightly know,” admitted Nagisa, catching the first of Rei’s burning-papers as it drifted back to earth, having smoldered away into a dusty bit of ash. “But she has grown uneasy of late, and I wonder that Makoto has not seen it.”

As Rei turned back to him in question, Nagisa shook his head. “No, it is plain as day why he noticed nothing,” said the dancer, “as smitten as he is.”

“He is akin to us in that, is he not?” chided the steward, laughing as Nagisa’s ears went red. He glanced down at his toes, and then up to Rei with beseeching eyes.

“I hardly knew you a minute before I loved you,” he muttered. “Nay, I loved you the moment you caught my gaze in the feasting hall the day you arrived.”

“My heart was wholly claimed when a mischievous dancer laid a rose before my plate at supper,” said Rei, taking Nagisa’s hands. “ _Amarya,_ I have no wish to take it back again.”

“You have studied Qasrian?” asked Nagisa, looking up again at the endearment.

“Aye, since I was a child,” said Rei, recalling the days he had spent with his tutor, reciting the sweet words time and again until the sharper accents of the Iwatobian tongue wholly left his speech. “I spoke rightly, did I not?”

“Indeed, _rouhiya_ ,” replied Nagisa, stifling a chuckle as Rei pressed his hands to his face. He glanced away from Rei and dug through his robes until he withdrew a small silk packet, tied shut with a satin drawstring and embroidered with the slanting characters of the dancer’s family name. Nagisa placed it upon Rei’s open palm before turning back to his pail of sparklers, lighting a flaming wheel and fixing it to a square of bronze before jumping back and watching it whirl about its heart on the paving-stones. Once the paper had burned away, Nagisa glanced back at Rei, who was studying the little pocket as if he had never seen such a thing before.

“You need not wear it now,” said Nagisa quietly, bringing Rei’s left hand to his lips and kissing it thrice before closing the fingers of the right upon the gift. “But should you wish to, it is yours.” He coughed softly as the wheel spat forth a coil of smoke, but his voice was as steady as ever when he spoke again.

“As am I.”

Rei opened the sachet with trembling hands, and from the mouth of the bag there fell a ring—a delicate band of silver filigree, starred with a pair of pointed amethysts the hue of the steward’s eyes. A sob broke from his throat at the sight of it, and he sank to the tile with the ruddy ash of the burning-papers.

The manservant had been away from Iwatobi for no more than a moon and a half, but the light sparking like fire upon the trinket cradled in his palms seemed to have changed him fully. The citadel he had called home for close upon twenty years was no longer home to him—no hearth could be his from that night forth, if Nagisa did not name it his own as well. He had scarcely known laughter before laying eyes upon the lad, whose levity shone in his very skin. Nagisa had brought beauty from the steward’s hands as he had never been able to do alone, in the shimmering portraits of a deathless prince and a maid kissed by the heavens, in the lilting lines of song that had blossomed from the throats of fifty-odd dancers through the night, in the eyes that had long since lost the anxious frown that hovered between them, surrendering their looks of worry for lingering glances that held nothing but joy.

He loved Nagisa as he had never loved before, loved him as he thought a priest ought to adore his God, and the words of both Iwatobi and Atar Qasr denied him as he fought to make his heart known to the one who held it in his grasp. He struggled for but a moment before he fell silent, offering his left hand to Nagisa. The ring lay in state upon his upturned palm, and as Nagisa looked up with tears brimming upon his lashes, Rei found his lips parted in a smile the likes of which he had never worn before. He nodded, his own sight veiled by a blur of water as Nagisa crowned his third finger with the circlet of silver before flinging himself into Rei’s arms and weeping into the steward’s robes.

“ _Rei_ ,” he cried, trembling like a leaf as the Iwatobian strained him to his heart, kissing Nagisa’s brow again and again with his heart on his lips until the dancer lifted his face to receive a kiss upon his cheek, and so they remained as the floating slips of paper burned about them like fiery stars before departing the balcony and flying out across the gardens at the breath of a sudden wind.

They broke apart some minutes later, laughing and crying at once as Gou came running across the terrace to embrace them both with Rin and Seijurou at her heels. Momo and Sakura brought up the rear, whooping in glee at the sight of the pair by the balustrade and the ring upon Rei’s hand.

“Where have Makoto and Haru-chan gone?” asked Nagisa, looking over Sakura’s shoulders in search of the absent princes.

“They retired after the performance,” said Rin, who had seen them go. “Makoto was nearly falling asleep where he sat through supper, for he and Haru took most of the preparations upon themselves.”

They frolicked about on the balcony for a while after that, Sakura chasing the shrieking Rin between the flowerbeds with a pair of orange sparklers, and small Ren climbing up to the edge of the parapet to light a bundle of burning-papers at once, each one inscribed with a blessing for marriage. They rose into flame for no more than a moment, but Ran and Hayato had dragged out a full crate of the slips between them, and the three children kept their corner of the garden filled with points of light like a swarm of fireflies. Momo and Gou had found a pail of spinning- wheels, and with Seijurou’s help affixed them to a handful of yellow rockets and fired them from the balustrade.

Before long, the lanterns were brought out from the storerooms, and Rin and Momo went off to wrestle a boxful for the others. Ran knotted hers to Hayato’s and pushed them gently from the terrace, while Ren clamored to light one with Nagisa and Rei. Seijurou and Gou tied three together by their tails before letting them take flight, and watched them disappear out into the evening with soft smiles upon their lips. Sakura and Momo set off a pair, as was their custom, and after that the lad flitted away to the rest of the dancers to find Malka, who was leaping up the steps to the palace with a burning firecracker in each hand…

* * *

Many hours later, Ren had fallen asleep under a rosebush, where Nagisa stumbled over him in search of the embroidered sachet that had held his ring. Rei lifted the lad into his arms and started back toward the palace, with Hayato and Ran clinging wearily to his robes and Nagisa’s hand in his.

“A great deal has come to pass since you came to Qasr, hasn’t it?” asked the dancer, looking about the sparking points of fire that still drifted about the terrace, lit by stragglers who had relieved the attendants of their burdens and chosen to remain outside.

Rei nodded, for still he felt as if he might weep with joy. The night had been lovelier than a dream, watching Nagisa’s cherished hopes ripple into life under the swinging lights of the dais, their embrace behind the curtains to the dressing-chamber, receiving the jewel that shone proudly upon its chosen finger, filling the gardens with bits of glimmering enchantment and setting them afloat upon the early autumn breeze.

“It often happens so, when people love one another,” Ran piped up.

“What would you know of it, you little spider?” teased Nagisa, letting go of Rei to swing the girl up to his shoulders.

“I know better than you, that is sure,” she said solemnly, kneeing the long-suffering dancer in the ribs. “Now ride!”

Nagisa galloped obligingly up the steps to the doors, leaving Rei to follow. He turned back to the garden as he stood upon the threshold and gazed up at the stars, whispering a prayer of thanksgiving before carrying Ren and Hayato to their beds.

* * *

When Haru awoke the following morning, Makoto was nowhere to be seen. A swift glance about the chamber proved that he had risen early, leaving Haru’s breakfast upon the table by the window before departing. The prince sighed at the sight and drew the covers up over his head, for now that the betrothal ceremony was over and done with, Makoto could no longer forgo his training with the soldiers. Haru had not so much as lifted a sword since leaving home, and for a moment he grinned at what his commander in Iwatobi would have said at the thought of her pupil lying abed past the tenth bell. The calluses on his knuckles were already beginning to soften—but he thought it fitting, for he knew that he himself was milder and gentler than he had been of old. His hands were suited for a shield and scimitar no longer, but for Milad’s smaller ones, and Haru could not have been happier for it.

He pushed himself upright and squinted across at the window, clambering to his feet and leaving Milad sleeping among the bolsters behind him. The prince felt restless in both body and spirit, and after bolting his meal of mackerel and lentils he found himself rooting through one of the packs he had stowed away in Rei’s room. He unearthed his prize at the bottom of the bag, beneath a pair of tunics his manservant had left behind: his cherished jars of paint and a thin book of gold leaf.

Haru well knew what he wished to paint, for the portrait had lingered half-finished in his thoughts from the day he arrived in Qasr—the bejeweled walls and ceiling of the throne room, boasting their golden tiles and glittering gems like mirrored pools offered to the noon-day sun. A few minutes more and he had gathered all he needed, his tray of soft brushes lying in state beside the row of colors and a tumbler of water at Rei’s sketching table.

“Now for a canvas,” he muttered, drawing a blank one from the pack. His face fell at once, for he knew at once that he could not hope to do justice to the glory of the royal hall upon a stretch of cloth no wider than his head.

Springing to his feet, he hurried into his own chamber, where Milad was stirring beneath his blanket. Haru whisked him from the bed and scrambled him into a clean frock before feeding the child his breakfast and leaping down the stairs to the lower levels of the palace, Milad under his arm.

“It is early, I know,” sighed Haru, bouncing the child until the sullen look went from his little face. “But your _aita_ must find himself some lath for a new canvas, and I was parted from you too long last night.”

“You speak to the child as if he knows your every word.”

Haru turned to see Rin stretched upon the floor in an alcove, champing away at a slice of melon. The advisor seemed to be as glad to be done with the betrothal as Haru was, and had betaken himself to the corridor by the kitchens to savor an hour of quiet in solitude while Makoto trained with the soldiers.

“He is a bright little thing,” said Haru tenderly, kissing Milad’s satin cheek as the baby furrowed his brow at Rin. “Makoto is certain he eavesdrops when we leave him to play in his cot.”

“I am sure any son of yours would do the same,” teased Rin, wiping the juice from his chin with a damp kerchief.

“He is as good as a son to me, but I have never been fond of eavesdropping,” chuckled Haru, seating himself upon the flagstones and letting Milad stand in his lap. “But have you not the preparations for your own marriage to see to, Rin?”

The advisor groaned and put his face in his hands.

“Do not remind me of it,” he muttered. “Sakura would be content with a handfasting at the Mikoshibas’ altar and supper afterward, but I mean to give her a wedding-day that wants for nothing—and she is sure to laugh at what I have been thinking of.”

“And what is that?” asked the prince.

“I thought we might have the handfasting in the evening, out in the gardens,” answered Rin, his voice softening at the picture. “It would look well to tie floating lanterns to the shrubs along the path, would it not? There would be fireflies about, and perhaps Hayato and the twins could catch a jarful to let them go after the vows were spoken. Nagisa and Momo have promised to dance the wedding-piece with Malka and Lili, and if I learn it before the week is out I shall be able to dance beside them. We would have sparklers, of course, as you did yesterday—red for my hair, and gold for her eyes.”

“Go on,” urged Haru, prying the heavy beads of his carcanet from Milad’s fingers.

“I chose almond sweetmeats for us to exchange, for she is fondest of them,” the elder lad went on. “After all, if we had milk-pudding, Momo and Nagisa would overturn the dish before we could eat of it, like as not.”

“She will not laugh, certainly,” chuckled the prince, permitting Milad to stagger into Rin’s arms. “Every minute of the day will be dearer to her than the one before, and when you are well and truly married you shall wonder why you worried so.”

“Thank you,” murmured the advisor, whose eyes shone with the tender spell that Milad laid without mercy upon all who chanced to behold him. “Would I be as apt a father as you have been to Milad, do you think—when Sakura and I have small ones of our own?”

“A better one, I am sure,” Haru replied, looking fondly at the pair of them as Milad grabbed for the ends of the ribbon in the Qasrian’s ruddy hair. “Makoto has told me you guarded Gou most carefully when you were children.”

“That was a brother’s foolishness, and nothing more,” said the curiously gentled Rin. “I was little good to anyone after my father was killed, least of all to Gou.”

“Was he slain in battle?”

“In battle? Nay, nothing of the kind. We accompanied Makoto and his parents to Martulah one summer, many years ago—for the Queen was Martulah’s crown princess, and my father was the sultan’s advisor, for they were as close as brothers.” Rin laughed quietly, kissing Milad’s nose as he continued his tale. “Neither would Makoto and I hear of being parted for a season, and so my mother thought Gou and I were old enough for the journey.”

Haru studied his friend’s face in silence, watching as love and pain mingled like coils of smoke in Rin’s claret eyes. The advisor folded his arms about Milad and strained him to his heart, as if the soft warmth of the wriggling child put strength into his blood.

“My father took me sailing with Makoto on our sixth morning in Martulah, for we wished to try our hand at fishing by one of the coves along the cliff. But a storm came upon us without warning, and the schooner overturned when we were struck by a wave.” Rin laid his face upon Milad’s head at the memory, stifling his tears in the locks of downy hair. “Makoto and I were cast up on the beach, but my father never returned to shore.”

He shook himself and turned back to Haru, resolve gleaming like steel in his gaze. “I swore I should return to the sea one day, that I should find the beauty in it that I once did—for he loved it even as it took his life—but I was too much a coward to travel to Martulah again, and Makoto has not left Qasr since, for my sake.”

“He would have been filled with pride, were he to see you now,” said the prince. “I have been here for only a moon and a half, and even I have seen how you stand by Makoto’s side, how you fret for Gou even now that she is wed and grown to womanhood, and how tenderly you love Sakura. You are a good man, Lord Matsuoka, and we do not forget it even when you go about shrieking in the corridors and raging at innocent manservants.”

Rin snorted. His eyes were damp, but laughter bubbled on his lips like wine, and he pressed Haru’s hand in thanks.

“Will you come to luncheon with me?” he asked, rising to his feet and smoothing the wrinkles from his gown. “Momo will be there, and so will Sakura.”

“I have given hope of seeing Rei at all of late, now that he is to be married,” smirked Haru, “To be sure, I will go.”

And with that the lads departed the corridor, having in the space of a quarter-hour brought the kingdoms of Qasr and Iwatobi together anew.

* * *

“Haru-chan!” called Ren, tapping softly at the door to Haru’s chambers. “Mother sent me with a message for you.”

“Come in,” answered Haru, mopping the sweat from his brow as he brushed an arc of vermilion onto his canvas.

Ren crept into the room on tiptoe, looking in awe at the great stretch of cloth that rose half-way to the ceiling. Rin had found a carpenter willing to make the frame, and an hour after luncheon Haru made his careful way up to the royal wing with a magnificent canvas, wide and long enough to bear the image of the throne room as it ought to be depicted. The prince began to paint the moment he set it against his parlor wall, and by the first gong of the evening the cloth was awash with yellow ochre, glinting here and there with gold leafing that Haru had stirred into the pot.

“It is beautiful, is it not?” asked Haru.

“It is almost as fair as the chamber already,” promised Ren. “If only I were as deft with a brush as you!”

“You will be, if you are not already,” answered the Iwatobian, glancing toward the little lad with a grin. “After all, the miniatures on Makoto’s dressing table are lovelier than anything I have crafted, and I know the hand that made them.”

The little lad blushed at Haru’s words, gaze falling to his toes as the elder prince chuckled and looked back to the canvas, bracing his elbow upon the side of his ladder as he worked a pinch of indigo into a dash of scarlet, dipping his brush into the violet pool that bloomed into life below his blade.

“What word do you carry from your mother, then?” asked Haru.

“She and your aunt the Queen are playing at cards in her chambers with the Princess Kazumi,” answered Ren, perching like an owl upon the sketching-table. “She has asked you to join them, if you may.”

“I had hoped to work until supper, but I shall go and gladly,” came the reply. Haru leapt to the floor and made for his own room, but a call from the open door to Makoto’s chambers stopped him in his tracks.

“Nay, you ought not to go,” laughed Ran, bounding into the parlor with Hayato at her heels. “Or you shall be drinking tea until midnight, and discussing matters that are of concern to the ladies of the citadel. Father is made to join now and again, and he is hardly himself when he is let out to his study again.”

“Indeed? But how am I to refuse, Ran?”

“They do not truly wish for you to come,” Hayato remarked. “I was there with Ren when he was given the message, and it seems that Her Majesty has sorely missed the company of ladies of her station. I would not take your mother from her, nor your aunt—and not even by joining them for cards or torguz kogol.”

“Ah, that was the game they were at!” cried Ren, turning a somersault and tumbling into Rei’s best armchair. “Mama had the torguz board beside her, I remember.”

“Father sent me to ask if you would join him in his library,” Ran continued, looking beseechingly up at Haru. “Will you, then? I will tell Mother you are with him.”

“The latter summons is surely the better of the two,” Haru jested—untruly, for he missed his mother dearly. Yet neither she nor Kaguya had sought him out after the betrothal, and he thought perhaps they had not remembered him in his absence as often as they would have done in better times—for they had worked their fingers nearly to the bone for the past month, keeping the folk of Iwatobi fed and watered as the goods from Qasr began to arrive.

As the three children departed the chamber, Haru shed his stained tunic and donned one of his short gowns—one that he had not dared to take outside his own apartments, for fear that wearing a cropped robe would be unseemly for a lad of nearly twenty. But he was a lad born and grown to manhood in Iwatobi, and he found that he cared no longer what the folk of Qasr would think of him dressing as he would at home.

He lifted Milad from his cot and set him upon his shoulders, tucking Ren’s smiling poppet into his girdle as he made his way to the upper level of the royal wing, where the sultan dwelled with his queen. There were but two doors here—one to their own quarters, Haru supposed, and one that stood ajar, boasting a collection of manuscripts finer than any the prince had seen in his own land. At the echo of his soft footsteps across the tile, Masoto appeared upon the threshold, ushering Haru into the threshold and shutting the door behind him.

“It is good to see you again, my son,” he said kindly, laughing up at Milad as the baby tugged at a lock of Haru’s hair. “You have been such a help to us all—working and night and day with Makoto and Rin for the betrothal, despite our custom that the promised pair should not be troubled with such things.”

“Ought I not to have done?” asked Haru, swinging Milad down to the floor and glancing anxiously at his father-in-law. “Is it ill luck for the bridegroom to prepare for the engagement?”

“Nay, nothing of the kind,” the sultan assured, pointing Haru to a seat by his table. “It is only that he should not come to his intention of marriage with great shadows about his eyes, as you did. The worry ought to have been for us alone, but I do not think my son could have finished his duties without you—and I am grateful you thought to aid him.”

“Aye, he hardly slept, and Rin tore out nearly half his hair,” answered the prince, recalling the days before he had joined his friend in his work.

“His father was just so,” replied the elder man, seating himself across from Haru with a fond smile upon his gentle face. “Lord Matsuoka drove himself nearly to his wits’ end for my sake, time and again, and I shall never have a friend that loved me so well, now that he is dead.”

“Rin told me of how it happened,” Haru raised his eyes to the sultan’s and found that they were damp, stirred nearly to weeping at the late advisor’s name. “I am sorry, my lord.”

“It was no fault of yours, child,” said Masoto, blinking the water from his lashes. “Only mine, perhaps, that I could not join them that morning—for I was the better swimmer, and I might have brought him and the little ones safely back to shore.”

Haru did not reply, for he saw at once that Lord Matsuoka’s death was as fresh in the sultan’s heart as it was in Rin’s, and knew well enough that no friendly word could staunch the wounds when they chose to bleed.

“Yet I did not ask you to my chambers to speak of such things,” Masoto went on, pulling a book of poetry from a shelf to his right. “It has been many years since I read a word of the Iwatobian tongue, and I fear I have grown so foolish that I cannot read even my old governess’s dearest verses. Will you write them out in the common speech for me, lad?”

“To be sure,” said Haru, taking the proffered pen and plunging the nib into a silver inkwell. “Where shall I begin?”

Masoto opened the volume and set it before him, pointing to the elegant characters with a calloused finger. “The seventh chapter, here.”

Haru lowered his gaze to the page and found to his astonishment that he knew the lyrics, for his mother had sung them to him in his childhood as he and Rei lay sleepily in her lap, reluctant to leave its warmth for their cot. The verses had been bound up in his most beloved dreams for longer than he could recall, and their words drifted one by one to his lips as he traced them upon the parchment.

_Kono michi ya yuku hito nashini, natsu no kure._

“Along this road no one goes, this summer evening.”

_Soshite yume wa kareno wo kake-meguru, tabi ni yande._

“And my dreams wander the withered fields, ill upon their journey.”

_Uki ware wo, sabishigarase yo! kankodori._

“Not the sadness of men, O cuckoo! but thy lonely cry.”

_Yuku haru ya tori naki uo no me wa namida._

“For spring departs as the birds weep at her going, and the eyes of the fish are full of tears.”

_Shizukesaya! iwa ni shimiru, semi no koe._

“O the silence! made lovely by cicadas’ song whispering into the temple stone.”

_Toshi kurenu, kasa kite waraji hakinagara._

“Another year has gone, and still I wear my straw hat and slippers.”

The verse ended in a sob, and to his horror he found himself beginning to weep, bending like a reed over the book and watering the yellowed pages with his tears.

“My son, what ails you?” asked Masoto in dismay, rising from his place and hurrying to Haru’s side. “Are you ill?”

“Nay,” sobbed Haru, drawing the sleeves of his gown across his eyes. “I recalled Iwatobi for a moment, and I could not help myself. I am sorry, my lord. Forgive me.”

“Are you so lonesome, then?” said the sultan. “Have Makoto and the others left you to yourself too often? I shall have words with them, if it is so—”

“No!” cried the prince. “He is with me far more often than not. I loved this rhyme in my youth, and it has been many years since I heard it—nothing more, my lord. You have my word.”

“I do not ask for your word, child,” said Masoto, setting a steady hand upon Haru’s shoulder. “Only that you would speak if you were unhappy, for both Natsuko and I would spare no pains to see your heart made light again. Do you wish to return home with your mother when she goes, Haruka? It was remiss of me to ask for your presence for a quarter-year, perhaps—you are younger than my own son, and it would be hard indeed to send him away for so long.”

“No, my lord. I will remain as long as I am able, for I have grown fond of your kingdom—and Makoto loves Milad as dearly as I do. They ought not to be parted yet, I think, and I should miss him terribly if we went so soon.”

“Are you certain?”

“As certain as I have been of anything, Majesty.”

“Then suffer me this, at least—that you will be kind to an old man and ease his worry by returning to your chambers.” Haru opened his mouth to protest, but Masoto shook his head. “Nay, my prince, do not think of the verse. You may come back again if you wish it, but a good supper and a quiet evening will do you good, and I do not wish to see you in these chambers until you have had them both.”

He called his manservant from the next chamber, and the good-natured fellow took Milad into his arms and led Haru from the room, accompanying him back to his own apartments on the floor below. When the man had gone, Haru went to his bedchamber and fell back upon the mattress with Milad clinging to the front of his gown. The prince caught the child’s rose-leaf hands in his and kissed them until the baby shrieked with laughter, wriggling away from the embrace as best he could and putting the poppet’s feet into his mouth. Milad’s chuckling sent peace into Haru’s heart like a draught of elderflower wine, and he gazed upon the drowsy little soul drifting toward sleep upon his chest with his heart in his throat.

Haru often let the word fall from his lips, to jest with Makoto when Milad began to wail at the sight of his bath or covered his face with sieved fruit at breakfast—yet he had never permitted himself to utter it in his own thoughts, lest he awaken again in the double bedchamber in Iwatobi to find that the priceless treasure before him had been naught but a dream, longed for so dearly that it descended from the stars to bring him joy before returning to the heavens again.

“My _son_ ,” he murmured, wondering at the sound as if it had broken upon his ears anew. “My son.”

It was as if the world had changed in an instant—as if the dark had replaced itself with light, as if shadow burned at the flickering lamps instead of flame. He was himself no more, no longer the careless lad who ran from the room at lesson-time, nor the adoring tot who trailed after his cousin at all that he did, nor yet the sullen youth of the past five years, worrying Aki and Rei nearly to death as they watched a silent man arise where the beloved prince had been. Gone were the lingering frowns and the sorrowing look that had haunted his face, for he was cherished by his child as he had never been cherished before.

“Are you happy, _abn?_ ” Haru whispered, pressing the small fist to his lips as he began to cry again. “To have me as your father?”

Milad stirred sleepily and put his hand to Haru’s cheek, before finding voice with a word that stole the breath from his father’s lungs.

“Papa.”

The soft coo would have been the undoing of a much harder man, and when Makoto entered the bedchamber half an hour later he found Haru weeping in earnest over Milad’s cot, crooning an Iwatobian lullaby between his sobs.

“Haru!” he cried, crossing the room at a bound to stand beside his friend. “What ails you? I returned as quickly as I could, for Father told me you were taken ill when you were with him in the study.”

“Nay, I am not ill,” sighed Haru, drying his face and turning to the Qasrian. “It has been weeks, but tonight I dare to call myself father—and Milad my son.”

“He has been yours since the moment you set eyes upon him, _amarya_ ,” said Makoto tenderly.

“And what of you?”

“What of me?”

“Milad will never have a mother, for a mother he has had—one who loved him more than life, and no other woman can fill her place,” answered Haru. “But you are no lady, and you have done no less for him than I.”

“I cannot think that he would like to bid his father farewell for nine months of the year,” gasped the elder prince.

“He shall not have to—not for long, at any rate,” said the Iwatobian, looking up at Makoto from beneath a veil of inky lashes. “For I am to be wed into your house, and Ran is its only daughter. It would be a shame to part her from her brothers, would it not?”

It was as if his heart had been broken, Makoto thought—broken and forged again under the breath of the bellows, precious gold shining in the firelight where an orb of tempered glass had shattered no more than a moment ago. He took Haru into his arms and wept into his shoulder, blubbering his thanks like a child given its dearest wish, clutching his friend as if he clung to life itself.

“I prayed for it night and day—and yet I did not dare to hope that all three of you might remain beside me.”

“I?” asked Haru, bewildered. “You—you hoped for me to make my home in Qasr after the marriage, and not only for Ran?”

“You are my friend, Haru-chan,” said the other, bestowing a swift kiss upon the younger lad. “I would not be parted from Rin, or from Gou—nor you, now. But what of your family? Will you not miss them?”

“I do not rightly know,” Haru confessed. “Aki’s wedding will be held before the year is out, and certainly we will not be always together as we were before I journeyed here. But Rei will return to Qasr once his father agrees to his marriage, and of course there is Milad to think of.”

“Your parents?”

“I love them dearly, but I am not as near to mine as you are to yours,” shrugged the prince. “It has always been Rei, Aki, and I.”

“I am glad, Haru,” said Makoto. “That there shall be a day when I need not dread your leaving again.”

“And I,” yawned Haru, curling up upon the pillows as Makoto clambered over the bolster to lie beside him.

* * *

Haru was shaken from sleep by a low rumble echoing through the room.

He lay for a moment in silence, wondering what the sound at his window had been. It was as if small stones were being thrown from the kitchen courtyard, making purchase upon the glass before tumbling back to the vegetable gardens below—

The prince went still before throwing back the covers and leaping across the chamber to the east wall, coming to a halt before the curtains.

It had begun to rain.

The Iwatobian tore himself away from the spectacle before him and departed the chamber, bounding down the stairs until he stumbled into the entrance hall. A line of weary guards stood before the doors, and even half-mad as he was Haru was sure they would not let him pass out into the gardens. He cast his eyes about until he glimpsed the narrow passage that led belowstairs, taking the steps two at a time until he came upon a side-door. The prince lifted the latch and ran out onto the terrace, thrilling to his toes as the falling deluge struck his body with the force of a mallet.

He had never known such a storm before—the rains in Iwatobi were fiercer when they came, and warm as a heated bath. The icy waters of the Qasrian monsoon washed over his shoulders like a song, leaving him chilled to the bone as he sprang headlong into a puddle, slipping across the tile like a colt still unsure of its feet. A fork of lightning split the night again, and as Haru turned his face to the heavens he thought that he had never in all his life looked upon such beauty.

Haru shed his slippers and went to lie between the flowerbeds, splashing idly at the pool widening about him as he blinked the rain from his eyes. It was water as it ought to have been, careless of its bounty as it brimmed from the stars to break upon the soil that could not hope to receive it.

He remained beside the lilies-of-the-valley for an hour or more, watching the ivory blossoms tremble as the wind rushed upon the gardens, sighing above even the thunderclaps when they broke upon the citadel.

“ _Haru!_ ”

The voice was Makoto’s, and Haru scrambled to his feet as he glimpsed his friend standing in the open passage by the door, clad in nothing but his sleeping garments.

“Haru-chan, you’ll catch your death!” shouted Makoto, vaulting over the half-walls and running to his side. Haru did not dare to protest as the Qasrian led him back to their chambers, opening the door to the parlor with fumbling hands. Haru wrung out his sodden tunic upon the floor as he crossed the threshold—and wished at once that he could run straight back to the terrace. Perhaps even to Iwatobi, for he would be safe there as long as Nagisa remained where he was.

Rei stood beside the sketching-table, spectacles flashing in the firelight as he glared at his troublesome charge. He sighed at the sight of them, water trickling slowly from their breeches to the floor, and pointed toward the washroom with a finger that shook with rage. Haru went without a word and found that the bathtub had been filled with steaming water.

A minute later, Rei slipped into the chamber and shut the door behind him. His master was buried fully under the bubbles, and naught but a tuft of sooty hair betrayed his presence in the room. The manservant went to the tub and yanked Haru to the surface by his neck, shaking it gently for good measure.

“Are you _mad?_ ” he hissed, his hair standing on end like the feathers of an angry goose. “What possessed you to leave your chambers in this weather?”

Haru did not answer, for he had been silenced by a fit of sneezing. Rei put his face in his hands and shook his head.

“How am I to leave you, Haru?” he asked anxiously. “I would not take Nagisa from Qasr, although he is willing to go—”

“I will make my home here after my wedding, Rei.”

The steward turned to Haru in astonishment. “What in Heaven’s name for? You would leave Aki alone, and your parents?”

“I cannot part Ran from her family,” murmured the prince, sinking into the water until his chin rested upon the cloudy suds. “Nor can I part Milad from Makoto.”

“Has she spoken a word on the matter?” asked the bemused manservant. “She is but a child, and I cannot think that the marriage means much to her now.”

“Nay, it does not,” agreed Haru.

“And what has Makoto to do with Milad?”

There was no reply, for the prince drew himself below the water again in a clear dismissal. Rei rose from his place and went out, finding Makoto clad in a fresh tunic in the bedchamber beyond. The Qasrian stood by the window, watching the storm as the flares of the lightning rose and fell like white flame across his face.

Rei sighed once more and departed for the sitting room.

* * *

“If you do not cease your sniffling, _Haru_ , I shall ask Azar to put a good dose of pepper into your tea.”

“You would not dare.”

“Indeed, I would. If you had not been such a fool as to run out into the rain in nothing but your nightshirt, _I_ should have been helping Sakura choose the bill of fare for our wedding.”

Haru sniffed again and glared at the advisor, who had thrown himself across the foot of the prince’s bed with a book.

Despite the swiftness of his bath the night before and the bowl of scalding broth that Rei poured down his throat after he was dressed, Haru had woken the next morning with a cough and a streaming nose. Makoto had bundled Milad out of the room upon the Iwatobian’s command, taking the child to the performance halls with Kashi, Hayato, and the twins.

“You detest planning, Rin,” scoffed Haru, sneezing into his kerchief.

“A man doesn’t marry his beloved every day.” Rin put his nose in the air and tucked one of the prince’s pillows beneath his knees. “Not another word, or I’ll fetch the pepper myself.”

Haru made a face at his friend and looked back at his own book. Rei had shouted himself hoarse when the sound of Haru’s coughing shook him from slumber at dawn, and after a lengthy scolding went to the brazier in the washroom to brew a pot of yarrow tea. Once the prince had been fed and wrapped in both his blankets and Rei’s, the manservant removed the volumes of poetry from the shelf by the bed and replaced them with a dog-eared Qasrian grammar.

“ _That_ is your punishment,” Rei had said, pouring out a cupful of bean broth and setting it before his troublesome charge. “I cannot sit beside you to-day, for the Queen and the Princess have called for me—but you will surely find your way into mischief if you are left to yourself, so I shall send Rin to oversee your studies.”

Rin, when he arrived, took little interest in the grammar—for he had grown to manhood speaking the common tongue, as did the better part of the nobility throughout the five kingdoms. After promising Rei that he would send for a healer if Haru grew worse, Rin had shaken Haru nearly to death and shrieked at the Iwatobian until he clutched his head and begged for mercy. Upon glimpsing the sudden pallor in the prince’s cheeks, the guilty Rin left Haru to himself and went off to find something to occupy himself in Rei’s room—the very tale that Haru had been reading, now beyond his reach until his traitorous steward saw fit to return it.

Haru narrowed his eyes at the grammar and flung it across the bed to the dressing-table.

“Has the book offended you?” asked Rin, turning to a new leaf of his romance with a poorly-hidden grin upon his face. “Whatever shall Rei think when he learns your Qasrian is as pitiful as ever?”

“He shall not say a word,” grumbled Haru. “Will you bring me the roll of parchment by the looking-glass? I must finish my letter to Aki before the next caravan goes at sunset.”

The advisor went without protest, returning a moment later with the half-finished epistle and an inkwell. Haru took up his pen and set to work, pausing now and then to wrestle the blankets back from Rin.

_Dear Aki,_

_My letters have been short for the past weeks, and for that I am sorry—for Makoto, Rin, and I have had our noses to the grindstone preparing for my betrothal. I shall have but a day or two of rest before I will be called upon again, for Rin and Sakura are to be married at last. Our mothers have joined them in the wedding preparations—it is a pity that neither of us has a sister, for now that Mother and Aunt Kaguya have Sakura and Gou to dote upon I know how dearly they must have longed for daughters of their own._

_Queen Natsuko has made fast friends with the pair of them, and they take tea together every afternoon. They requested my company one evening for a game of_ toguz korgol, _but little Ran said that I ought to know where I was not wanted, and so I found myself suddenly invited to the sultan’s library to translate a piece of Iwatobian poetry for him. I cannot say what it was, but glimpsing the verses of our speech again hurt me greatly. I went no further than toshi kurenu, kasa kite waraji before I began to cry like a child. Makoto’s father was sorely worried, and was sure I must be unwell. He would not hear of me finishing the verse, and called for an attendant to escort me back to my apartments._

_Rei’s letter shall arrive before mine, for he had it ready the morning after the feast—so you must know that he too is to be wed, to the head of the dancers’ guild, Nagisa. Neither of them have spoken to me of a wedding date, but I do not think Rei will remain in Iwatobi for long when we return; he will of course have to journey back with me, to receive his parents’ blessing, but I when I depart from Qasr again next autumn I will cross the desert alone._

_Iwatobi is all that fills my dreams of late, the great reservoir at the heart of the citadel, the feasting court and the golden dunes, our chambers in the palace, and even Rei’s horrid scrubbing brushes—I vow I feel them scouring me from head to toe at the thought. Perhaps I am not suited for life in Qasr—the skies are hardly without a cloud or two, and the days have not burned like the days at home all the while we have been here. It has rained, as well—and I have found that running about out of doors in a storm makes one ill. Rin scolded terribly, but how was I to know the rain would be chill? The monsoon is as warm as tea at home, after all. Rei put me into a hot bath the moment I returned to my rooms, but it did nothing, and I write to you with an irksome cough and a cleaving pain in my head. I shall not repeat my error in a hurry, for Rin’s scoldings are worse than Rei’s, and my nose aches dreadfully._

_My heart longs for home, Aki—and yet at the thought of leaving Qasr it breaks twice as badly. How can it be so—that to remain away from you wounds me so greatly, but that my wounds should not be healed by returning? I have always been sure of my mind, and for the first in nearly twenty years it is no longer so. You are perhaps the only one I am sure of, for Rei is no longer as he was and even Mother seems altered after my months away from home. Perhaps it is I who am changed, and not the pair of them at all._

_I await your answer with impatience, for now that we have not spoken since midsummer I find myself looking for your chicken-scratch among the letters whenever a caravan arrives from Iwatobi. Write me back soon, Aki, for I wish to hear all that afoot. And tell Jun that she may have my Mahzarin until I return—and after, if Mahzarin does not mind it. She was always fond of horses, was she not?_

_All my love,_

_Haru._

* * *

The following morning, Haru woke to find the heaviness gone from his chest and the pain in his head greatly lessened. He was alone in the chamber, for Milad was sleeping in the nursery with Hayato and the twins, and Makoto had remained in his own room as Haru and Rei had ordered him to do.

Rei, mindful as ever of his friend’s comfort, had left a good breakfast upon the dressing table—mackerel in sour broth and a heap of steaming mushrooms stewed with carrots. Haru bolted the fish, but left the carrots to themselves until Rin bounded into his bedchamber with a piece of  in hand.

“What have you there?” asked Haru, looking longingly toward the washroom.

“A message from Iwatobi,” sang the advisor, springing away as Haru’s fist shot out to seize the heavy envelope. “Which you are not to have until you finish your breakfast, upon Rei’s command.”

Haru choked the carrots down with a vengeance and plucked the letter from Rin’s fingers. The man surrendered the note with good grace, wandering off to look at the half-finished painting of the throne room as Haru broke his cousin’s seal and lowered his eyes to the page, frowning as he scanned the lines of graceful print. It was only the fourth letter he had had from Aki after coming to Qasr, and Haru no longer recalled what had been in the one he himself had written the month before. Haru wrote every week without fail, but often he could not remember which of his notes Aki was answering to when his cousin’s letters arrived.

_Dearest Cousin,_

_It is two months now that I have woken to an empty chamber, and it is dreadfully dull without you. Dull, of course, until Jun arrives for our daily meetings—for she is as bold and cheerful as she was when we were children, and when we met again five weeks ago it was as if the years that parted us had never been. I felt as if I was a lad of fifteen again when we left the palace after dark to go riding as we used to, but always it lingered in my thought that you and Rei were not beside me._

_Jun misses you nearly as greatly as I do—indeed, all we spoke of over luncheon for the first week was our pair of little shadows, and how Rei poured syrup into my hair before a petition day. Can you believe It was_ Jun _who had given it to him—I cannot fathom how they kept it between them for ten years. Perhaps Rei has forgotten, but Jun certainly did not, to my grief. I have also found that when you and Rei were three, you quarrelled over her hand in marriage until the both of you began to snivel, and that she settled the fight by bestowing a kiss upon your unworthy brows and announcing her intention to wed me instead. It is a sore blow indeed when a man discovers that his bride’s first suitors were his toddling baby brothers, but as my little brothers are dear beyond measure to me I shall excuse it this once._

_Now that we are speaking of brides, how fares your small princess? You mentioned in your first letter that she and the Shigino boy fancied themselves sweethearts, of a sort. If Ran is anything like my Jun, I do not doubt that there may yet be trouble over it—after all, they will only grow closer over the years, for his family will remain beside hers as long as Lord Shigino is Masoto’s advisor. It is nothing now that they are but children, but when they come of age your wedding ought not to break a pair of hearts, at least. Makoto is friendly with you, is he not? If he loves his brother and sister as you say he does, perhaps it would be meet to speak of the matter with him. It is true enough that you shall never fall in love with Ran, nor she with you, but it is better by far have a friend for a wife, rather than a lady who holds you in contempt for taking her from the one who truly holds her heart._

_It was why Jun was parted from me, or so she told me in confidence. It was plain to her mother and father that we had grown to love one another, for all that we were only fifteen and thirteen when she left the court, and they would not have their daughter’s affections given to a lad who might not be free to wed her. It would be a pity to break Hayato and Ran apart thus, but it is better than a life-time of grief for the three of you. Reflect upon what I have told you, and then do what you think best._

_I hope my letter finds you in good health, and little Milad—I spat out my tea when I heard the news, and will never dare to open your letters over breakfast again. It is far better that I read them with a divan safely beneath me, lest you shock me senseless with your epistles one day. It is charming indeed that he resembles you—and fitting that his eyes are green, for the land of his birth. It will be lovely to have little ones about again, and now I await your return home twice as eagerly. It is hardly what a man expects, that his little cousin of nineteen rides off to begin his courtship and comes back again in three moons a father, but I shall dote upon the lad as dearly as you do. After all, God willing, I will have small ones of my own before very long, and they deserve no less than an_ aita _who knows to raise them._

_Father and Uncle send their best; tell mother and Aunt Kazumi so, for our foolish King and Prince have, as ever, forgotten to write. It is a wonder they finish any of their duties without their wives, but I do not doubt that after twenty-five years with Jun at my side I will be just as much a good-for-nothing without her as they are now._

_All my love to you and to Milad (and to Rei, if he has forgotten to open his own letter now that he spends his days with the Qasrian dancer!)_

_Aki._

Haru laughed. Aki had not heard of the blossoming romance between Nagisa and Rei—indeed, he would hear nothing of it until Rei’s letter arrived in Iwatobi—but it seemed that his cousin had realized their friend’s feelings from nothing more than the first letter Haru had penned to him, the week after Nagisa had asked Rei to dance at the welcoming feast. He felt his heart grow light as he read the note again, feeling near to his cousin as he had not been for months. He laughed aloud once more as the dim recollection of asking Jun for her hand in marriage returned to him. He and Rei had adored her, trailing after her like a pair of little lovers when she came to their nursery and coming to blows with one another now and then for the privilege of sitting beside her at supper. It was nearly as sore a blow to them when her family retired to their estate outside the citadel as it was to Aki, and neither had been gladder for the happy couple when Hiromasa had asked her father for her hand on Aki’s behalf.

He glanced to the cot by his bed before he remembered that Milad was with the twins; the children’s absence and Makoto’s return to his duties meant only that Haru could set out upon the errand he had been delaying for the past fortnight. He turned Rin out of his chambers and dressed quickly, donning one of his short gowns again as he had done two days previously.

The week before the betrothal, he had sent an attendant down to a jeweler in the town with fifteen gold pieces and an order for a pair of rings; one a smaller copy of the very one he wore, set with sky-blue topazes rather than lapis lazuli, and one a twin of the band he had brought from Iwatobi for Ran. He trusted no one with the duty of collecting them but himself, and before long he had asked a servant for the way to the shop and set off past the palace gates to the citadel.

The townsfolk going about their business gave him a hardly a passing glance, for with his slight figure and cropped robe he passed for nothing more than a lad of sixteen, roaming the streets without a care in the world. His skin had grown darker after his arrival, and he looked as much like a Qasrian as the children and shopkeepers he met on his way. It took no more than a quarter of an hour to reach the jeweler, who brought the rings from the back room of his shop and presented them to the prince. Not a soul could have told the difference between the ruby ring and the one that he had given to Ran at the betrothal, and the topaz ornament perfectly suited the eyes of the one who was meant to wear it.

He returned as swiftly as he had come, putting his hand to his side now and again to trace the comforting shapes of the rings tucked into his girdle. Haru was back at the palace almost before he had realized, and once the guards bowed him past at the gate he took to his heels and fled up to the royal wing, stopping to catch his breath at his own door before passing Makoto’s and knocking softly upon the twins’.

“Who is there?” called a voice, hardly distinguishable for the giggles that choked it nearly to silence. Haru smiled, thinking for a moment of pelting through the dunes with Aki, Rei, and Jun at his side, and answered in tones far gentler than he had ever heard of himself before.

“It is Haru, Ren.”

“Haru-nii-chan!” came the cry. The door opened at once, and Haru bowed briefly to the little prince before bounding into their nursery and bursting into laughter at the sight that met him within.

Ran and Hayato had put the long-suffering Milad into a little cradle—one suited better for a doll than a child, from the size of it. The young girl had tied on an apron over her gown, and was feeding the chortling baby from a bowl of rice porridge, cooing as he swallowed the sweet mouthfuls with relish. Hayato had drawn a beard upon his cheeks and chin with what seemed to be Makoto’s kohl, and completed the effect with a set of clumsy black wrinkles upon his forehead. Ren himself was dressed in a frock and veil, cheerily unconscious of his missing petticoat.

“What are you playing at?” he chuckled, undoing his girdle and fumbling about for the little sachet that held the jewels.

“I am playing Mother, Hayato is Father, and Milad and Ren are our children,” chirped Ran, feeding Milad another spoonful of her breakfast. “Gou said we were not to have lessons today, and nii-chan said we could do whatever we wished.”

“He did, did he?” muttered Haru, wondering if Makoto knew how mischievous his young sister could become when given leave. “Hayato, Ran, come here to me. I have brought gifts for you.”

Ran abandoned the bowl of porridge and sprang to his side, shrieking in excitement as she went. Hayato followed, leaving Ren standing by the cradle, wringing his hands.

“And me, Haru-chan?” he asked, hesitantly meeting the elder prince’s eyes.

“Your gift is in my chambers,” said Haru, cursing himself for having forgotten what Ren might think of the presents. “I have not finished it, for it is a dreadfully large canvas to cover in a day.”

“The portrait of the throne room?” Ren gasped, fingers flying to his mouth as his eyes grew wide with wonder. “It is for me?”

“Do you know another little lad who loves painting so, then?” teased Haru. “Of course it is yours.”

Ren fell quiet, struck speechless at last, before coming to join the others and see what Haru had brought for Hayato and Ran. Haru opened the sachet and let the rings fall into his palm.

“Two days after I arrived in Qasr, you and I were meant to have luncheon together in the gardens,” he said to Ran. “But you did not come, and I went to the pools with Makoto instead.”

“I am sorry, Haru-chan!” she cried, looking like a child caught with its hand in a jar of sweets. “I did not mean to do it—but I wished to go out to play with Hayato, and—”

“I was under the mulberry tree by the hedge, waiting for you,” he said gently. “You and Hayato were sitting together upon the other side, and I heard you talking together there.”

Ran went pale. She looked beseechingly up at Haru, parting her lips for an explanation, but he shook his head and took her little hand in his.

“I have never loved anyone so,” he said, turning the topaz ring this way and that. “But you have, and it would be cruel indeed for me to take Hayato from you. This ring upon my hand means nothing now, and you need consider yourself betrothed to me no longer.” He stilled her shaking fingers and took the ruby trinket from them, slipping it into his pocket. Having done so, he put the jewels he had commissioned into her palm and shut it upon them.

“You will find that the topaz ring is small enough for Hayato’s hand, I think,” he said quietly, kissing her brow. “And that both Ren and I know the words to the betrothal vows, and would be glad to stand as witnesses. If the pair of you signed an intention of marriage, ours would be broken at once, would it not?”

Ran and Hayato burst into tears, clutching one another and flinging themselves into Haru’s arms. Ren scrambled off to the schoolroom, returning a moment later with a roll of parchment and a quill made from a swan’s feather. He exchanged a determined look with Haru and sat down beside him, while Hayato and Ran took their places across from them.

Haru said his words in the common tongue; Ren shouted them in excitable Qasrian, and then Hayato and Ran repeated them together, hand-in-hand and hardly stifling their weeping as they spoke the vows that the little girl had uttered only three days before at her betrothal feast.

_All the right of my House is thine._

_All the right of my Wealth is thine._

_All the right of my Blood is thine._

_All the right of my Name is thine._

_All the right of my Hand is thine._

_All the right of my Heart is thine._

It was done in a moment; Hayato and Ran signed below the hasty statement that Haru had drawn up on the parchment and laid their seals upon a mingled pool of scarlet wax between their names, Ran’s royal insignia and the mark of the Shigino family seeming almost to mingle together where they lay. Once the wax had cooled, Haru and Ren wrote their names in the witness’s place, adding their own coats of arms as they did.

At last the happy pair exchanged their rings, Ran putting Hayato’s upon his right hand so as to hide its meaning, and Hayato sliding hers onto the finger where the old one had been. And with that Ran Tachibana, second heir to the throne of Atar Qasr, was promised in marriage to the younger son of Lord and Lady Shigino—and the betrothal between Haru and Ran was broken, as void as if it had never been.

The three children shrieked for joy and leapt about the room as soon as the rings were in place, Haru catching Milad up in his arms and dancing across the tile to join them. Before he knew it Hayato and Ran were clinging tight about his waist and blubbering into his gown, and he sank to the floor to embrace them as Ren leapt onto his back. They would have noticed nothing outside the chamber in that instant, not even a thunderclap breaking upon the palace—

And certainly not the long shadow withdrawing softly from the threshold, nor the quiet footsteps departing as swiftly as they came.


	8. Woes and Weddings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Haru dreams of home, Rei makes a promise, and Nagisa has one too many at Rin's engagement party.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ALL RETURNING READERS, PLEASE PAY ATTENTION TO THIS NOTE!
> 
> If you don't follow me on Tumblr or haven't seen the updated tags, please note that this story is being illustrated by the incredible alsas! Both existing works of art (they are beautiful, beautiful works of art) are located in chapter 3. For those who don't want to go back and reread it, here they are:
> 
>  
> 
> [Haru in the bath of roses](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/167358811996/haru-sank-beneath-the-surface-blowing-contented)
> 
>  
> 
> [Haru and Makoto dancing at the welcoming feast](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/167526289261/it-doesnt-seem-as-if-hell-refuse-whispered)

“A story, a story!” cried Rei, leaping between Aki’s bed and Haru’s as the princes quarrelled over the worn book of fables in Aki’s lap.

“I want to hear the story of Rayan in the woods,” said Haru stubbornly, thrusting out his lip and trying with all his might to wrestle the volume from his cousin’s grip. “I don’t want to hear about a silly cobbler.”

Aki laughed and got to his feet.

“It was Rayan for the last week, wasn’t it?” he asked, turning to Rei. “We ought to have another one tonight.”

Rei cheered and crossed the floor again with a mighty leap, coming to rest upon Haru’s mattress. The little lad held open the covers and giggled at his sulking friend, who slipped a handful of candied violets out of Aki’s pocket and scurried across the rug to join him.

“ _I_ have your sweetmeats from supper,” crowed Haru, giving half of his fragrant spoils to Rei. “And now you’ll have to wait until breakfast to eat them, so _there_.”

“Alas,” cried Aki, putting his hand to his brow and falling to his knees. “You have struck me a death-blow, my brother! And how fierce was my faith in you!” He lay spread-eagled on the carpet until Rei and Haru begged him to douse the lamp, and by the light of the candles on Haru’s nightstand, Aki drew the little ones close to him on either side and began to read.

“Many years ago, in a kingdom as bright and beautiful as our own, there lived a cobbler with his wife,” said the crown prince, pointing out the faded pictures to Rei. “They loved one another dearly, and their only grief was that they had no child. At last they sought the aid of a holy man, who told them to wait until the festival of Goddess Isha and pray for a daughter before her.”

“Why a daughter, Aki?” asked Haru, tugging at his cousin’s sleeve. “If it was so long ago, wouldn’t they have wanted a little boy?”

“You will find out, if you keep still,” scolded Aki. The small prince pouted and wriggled under Aki’s arm, seating himself firmly in the elder boy’s lap.

“Go on!” cried Rei, laying his head on Haru’s knee as Aki cleared his throat.

“They did as they were counseled, and the cobbler’s wife gave birth to a girl the summer after the festival. She had skin as golden as wheat and hair darker than a crow’s wing, and they called her Uma. They adored her as they adored each other, and despite their poverty Uma grew to be a wise and beautiful maiden, beloved by all who knew her. She did everything in her power to aid her parents, setting her father’s tools out on his bench so that they might be ready come the morning, and learning to weave and mend until her craft was fine enough to earn a little coin alongside her mother’s in the marketplace. She brought them nothing but good fortune, and though they were poor Uma was given naught but the best food they could buy, and while her parents went barefoot now and then, she herself never did.

“And so the years went by, until Uma was twenty and ready to be married. They looked high and low for a groom for her, for they vowed she would not wed until they found a man who would look after her as they had done. Nothing came of their hunt for nearly a year, until a gilded carriage drew up to the city’s temple at the festival of Goddess Isha, when Uma and her mother always went to serve at the altar in return for the cobbler’s granted wish. It belonged to a wealthy merchant, and with him traveled his son Murad, a kind and learned man with a spark of laughter in his eye. He passed the threshold with no thought but to pray for the good of his family, but the moment he set eyes upon Uma, offering gifts of bread and milk to the beggars who had come to be fed, he knew he could have no other lady for his wife.

“But she was not known to him, and so he returned to the manor from whence he came, seeking to court her properly. He went down to the house of worship nearly every day, and often he saw Uma there, dressing the gods for the morning hymns and serving sacred fruits to those who came to pray. Before long he had become her friend and grown to love her for herself, and when he knew she loved him equally he journeyed to her home to kneel before her parents and ask for her hand in marriage. Once they had assured themselves that he was a good and honest fellow, they gave their blessing for Murad and Uma to wed. They were married in the early spring, and after the handfasting Uma went to live with Murad at his estate.

“The cobbler and his wife grieved for many months after her departure, but they knew their daughter was cherished as she deserved to be, and so they went back to their work as before. Five moons after her wedding the festival of the Goddess was held again, and now that the couple had been doubly fortunate as to have their Uma and to have her wed to a good man they wished to hold the worship in their own house.”

“But they were dreadfully poor,” said Haru, turning up his face to his cousin’s. “They would have to buy a figure, and—”

“Hush!” squeaked Rei, his violet eyes shimmering in the candlelight. He took his friend’s hand and held it tightly, as if to stave off another interruption, and at the touch Haru fought a smile and nestled back against Aki’s shoulder to listen.

“Aye, they were dreadfully poor,” Aki agreed, bestowing a kiss upon each little forehead. “And the figure was dreadfully dear, and he had no more than fifty pence to spare when he went to the craftsman to get one. He bought a very small one, and when he returned home to begin the preparations he found it hard, for he and his wife had not noticed their age when they had Uma at home to help them.

“And so his wife thought they might ask Uma to come for the fortnight, for her mother-in-law had a houseful of servants at her bidding, and could surely afford to let her son’s new wife return home for a while. The cobbler made the journey and humbly asked that his daughter be allowed to go home with him, but her father-in-law said that as a married woman she ought to worship the Goddess alongside her husband.”

“How cruel!” cried Rei, frowning thunderously up at Aki. “Uma was all they had in the world, and what right had he to speak for her?”

“Quite right,” nodded Aki. “She belonged only to herself, and ought to have chosen on her own. But she was not given a chance to speak, and her father set off for home alone.”

Haru squirmed disconsolately in his cousin’s lap, and Aki held him still as he directed Rei to turn to the next leaf.

“But lo! what do you think he saw coming along the lane behind him as he drew up by the gate?”

“A striped kitten,” suggested Haru, who had been longing for one for nearly a year.

“Nay, another little girl,” insisted Rei.

“No, you are both wrong,” laughed Aki. “It was his Uma, running to keep pace with him, crying out that her father-in-law had changed his mind. They were as happy as kings when she came back to the house, and on the first day of the festivities she said that all of their friends must be invited to dine. The cobbler had nothing to offer but the blessed fruits from the temple, and when the guests arrived he shut himself in his room, unable to watch them leave his table hungry. He went out again only when they had gone, and to his surprise he found that half of the plums and berries remained upon the platters.

“‘Did they not like them?’ he asked, wringing his hands.

“‘They found the fruit delicious, and they were sorry to leave the rest, but I do not think they could have swallowed another mouthful. Rest easy, father, for they did not go hungry.’ she replied.

“He did not see how it could be so, but said to himself that now his daughter had lived in a rich man’s house she would comport herself in a manner befitting her new station. So he kissed her in thanks and went to his bed, determined to trust his Uma at all that she did, no matter how worrisome it might seem to him. The next day the cobbler arose early and prepared a dish of lentils and greens to present to the goddess. He and his wife had seated themselves before her when they saw they had forgotten the garnishings and a goblet of water, and after returning with the things from the kitchen they found that Uma had begun to eat of the dish.

“‘Daughter!’ cried her mother, and rebuked her most harshly, for the offering was meant to be eaten after the prayer and now the food could not be shown to the idol at all. The cobbler shook his head and readied another dish, and after they had sung the lengthy hymns their work for the day was done.

“But on the second day Uma ate the offering before the prayer again, and for the first in all his years her father grew impatient with her. ‘You were never so greedy before you were wed, my child,’ he scolded. She bowed her head in remorse and said nothing, and so he forgave her and made a fresh kettle of broth for the meal.

“The next day, the cobbler left the pot in the prayer-room to cool, and when he returned to ladle out the fragrant rice he found that Uma had come and eaten of the dish a third time. Now he grew angry, for he was but a poor man and could not afford to prepare so much grain at once. He shouted at Uma and sent her from the room, telling her that if she had lost respect for their simple ways after but five months married to a lord, she could remain in his wasteful manor and not come home again. He regretted it bitterly as soon as he said it, but before he could tell her he was sorry Uma ran out into the garden and up the lane toward her husband’s house.”

“Mother would have done more than scold, wouldn’t she?”

“Haru, _hush!_ ”

Aki laughed “Aye, that she would. But the cobbler had never raised his voice to his daughter in all his life. He did not go after her, for he was greatly shamed at having hurt his child, and wept all through the night. At last he could bear it no longer, and when the run had risen he put on his coat and set off to tell her he was sorry and beg her to come back with him. He knocked at his father-in-law’s door with a bent head, and to his great surprise Uma threw it open and flung her arms about him. She listened to his weeping and was astonished, and when at last he dried his tears she told him that for the past four days she and her husband had begged his parents every morning to be allowed to return to her childhood home for the festival, and that they had received permission only that very afternoon.

“Uma and Murad avowed that she had not left the house at all, and were greatly mystified when the cobbler said she had been with him since the festival began. They both departed with him, and on their way back to the cottage they met a lady who had served at the temple with Uma before she was married. She hailed them and asked how Uma was faring as a wife, and as they went she told them that the lamps at the temple would not remain lit when fueled with the blessed oil. The priests had been making do with linseed for the sake of keeping the flames alive, until that very morning when the wicks came to life again.

“And it was then that he remembered his prayer twenty-two years ago, his prayer for a daughter who would stay by them as long as she was able. He and his wife had needed her more than ever during the festival, and so the goddess had left the temple and come to his house in her place. It was not Uma who had eaten the offerings and served the guests with fruit that had filled them as if by magic, but Mother Isha herself.”

Rei shrieked with delight, clapping his hands and shaking Haru by the shoulders until the little prince grew pale and dizzy. “I knew it was the Goddess!”

“Nay, you did not,” argued Haru, clinging to Aki’s robes to steady himself. “What happened then?”

“Why, the two families celebrated the remaining days of the festival as one, as they ought to have done from the beginning,” said Aki. “And Uma passed freely between her mother’s house and her husband’s whenever she pleased, as had always been her right. The next summer she gave birth to a daughter of her own, and she and Murad called her Isha. The baby brought as much joy to her parents as Uma had to hers, and all of them lived happily together for the rest of their days.” He shut the book, and promptly found himself knocked back upon the pillows by the little ones, who were bouncing up and down on his stomach and squealing in glee.

“That was a lovely tale!” cried Haru, rolling off his long-suffering cousin and dancing about the room hand-in-hand with Rei. “Will you read it again to-morrow, Aki?”

“No, I shall not!” laughed Aki, leaping off the bolsters and waltzing across the floor to join them. “It will be a fresh story tomorrow, whichever _I_ see fit to tell, and you shall like it as well as you loved tonight’s.”

“Very well,” grumbled Haru, holding himself as stiffly as a board as Aki tucked the little lads under his arm and carried them to bed. The elder prince drew the covers about Rei and Haru as they lay side-by-side among the cushions; Rei had his own room in the apartment, but Haru never permitted him to sleep there unless either of the younger boys was ill.

“Good night,” Aki whispered, kissing each satin cheek as the children drifted gently toward sleep. “Dream sweetly, _shin'ainaru-ko_.”

And with that he crept away to his own bed, whispering a quiet prayer for his brothers’ safekeeping into the night before he too fell into slumber.

*          *          *

Haru reached blindly for his steward when he woke, wondering where the younger lad could have gone so early in the morning. It was a minute or more before he remembered where he was: in the palace of Atar Qasr with little Milad snoring under the coverlets beside him. Makoto had gone, leaving a covered breakfast-tray behind him as usual. The prince sighed and stretched until the knots in his back were smoothed away, leaning back against the pillows as he recalled his dream of the bedchamber in Iwatobi and of the tales that Aki had read him and Rei every evening, indulging them in all that they wished without a word of reproof. Aki had looked after them too, he thought—patiently going over the Qasrian grammar with Rei until the boy could speak it as well as the common tongue, bandaging Haru’s knees when he fell from his pony and boosting him back into the saddle again.

He lay abed for perhaps five minutes more before he recalled that he was needed on the fourth level, flinging himself across the room and bolting his breakfast before rushing back to Milad and feeding the protesting child his own porridge. Once they had eaten, he drew on his day gown, snatched his lavender robe from the cupboard, and shot out the door and up the stairs with his tunic inside-out. Milad shrieked in complaint as his father bundled him out of bed, but said nothing more on the way to Rin’s chambers; he had long since grown resigned to riding on his father’s shoulders and being tossed about like a parcel. Such handling was inevitable if one happened to be Haru’s child, and Milad knew it.

When Haru let himself into the advisor’s rooms, he fought the urge to turn tail and run back to his own again, for the chamber before him had descended into chaos. He dodged a hastily thrown slipper before crossing the threshold, and as he looked about he saw Nagisa wailing in a corner as Rei attempted to wrestle him into a ceremonial gown, Seijurou sniffling into what seemed to be a tiny frock, Makoto kneeling on a divan with his face in his hands, and Momo bouncing from wall to wall with Ren and Hayato on his back. Rin was nowhere to be seen; it was (as Haru had so nearly forgotten) Rin’s wedding morning, and as his friends the others had accepted the duty of readying him for his marriage.

Makoto glanced up at the click of the latch and cried out in relief, unfolding his long limbs and making his way through the bedlam to Haru’s side.

“Thank Heaven you are here,” he said fervently, taking the Iwatobian’s hand. “I thought they would be easy to manage after last night, but I was gravely mistaken.”

Haru nodded, too astonished for words. They had held the engagement party the night before, the men in Makoto’s chambers with Rin and the ladies in the performance hall with Sakura and Gou. There had been dancing, and perhaps a few too many pastries and goblets of raspberry wine; Nagisa had drunk half his weight in elderflower cordial before Makoto rolled him into a blanket and put him to bed. Rin himself had had no more than a tumbler of palm-liquor, and among the Qasrians only Makoto had comported himself more gracefully. Haru had scarcely expected to find Nagisa and the Mikoshiba brothers so quickly recovered from the night, but the din was enough to prove they were good as new again.

“Where is Rin?” he asked, allowing Milad to toddle away to Momo and Ren. “And what upon earth is the matter with those two?” This last was directed at Seijurou and Nagisa, both of whom were sobbing as if their hearts would break.

“Rin is finishing his prayers at his mother’s altar,” said Makoto. Haru nodded, grateful that at least the bridegroom had kept his wits about him. “Seijurou came across one of Sakura’s baby frocks in his parents’ chambers, and so he began to cry, and when Nagisa found him blubbering in a corner he decided to weep to keep him company.”

Haru’s eyes grew wide, and he burst into a peal of laughter. “Truly? Oh, poor Rei!” The manservant was faring no better in his attempts to force his betrothed into the gown, and even little Milad was squealing in glee at the sight.

“He is to be pitied for the moment, indeed,” muttered Makoto. “I must go to Rin now, for it is the custom that a man’s brother sits beside him for the last of the prayers. Will you keep them from demolishing my chambers until then, Haru-chan?”

“Certainly,” chuckled the prince. Makoto shot him a grateful look and departed, leaving Haru alone with the madding crowd. The cacophony was softer than it had been when he entered, for Momo had betaken himself to the vanity by the window to put on his ornaments and Seijurou’s weeping was beginning to cease at last.

“Nagisa!” cried Rei, gently shaking the dancer’s shoulders. “The wedding is in an hour, and you _must_ get dressed.”

“No, I mustn’t!” howled Nagisa, shaking Rei in return. “Sakura is to be married, and perhaps she’ll leave the dancing troupe and let _Momo_ take her place, and I shall have to wait a year for _us_ to be wed, and—”

“ _Has_ he recovered from yesterday’s cordial?” asked Seijurou incredulously, looking across at Haru.

“He ought to have done,” frowned Haru. “It was the mildest we had, for even Ren and Hayato were given a sip at the toast.”

“He _would_ have been better by now,” sighed Rei, giving Nagisa up for lost and getting up to lace Hayato into his robes. “I did not have the heart to tell Makoto before he left, but Nagisa awoke after I retired and found the decanter of mead in the parlor.”

Seijurou groaned. “And I thought _Momo_ had taken it.” He turned to look at his brother, who was doing up the clasp of Ren’s heavy locket. “The more fool I, for Momo is always up to mischief.”

“Nagisa,” said the manservant, taking his betrothed by the shoulders again. “My love, there is no need to cry. Sakura will not give up her dancing while she has legs to dance upon, and a year will go by before long, you will see.”

“I don’t _want_ to wait a twelvemonth to be married, Rei-chan,” gulped Nagisa, breaking into a fresh flood of tears. “I shall miss you dreadfully, and Mako-chan will miss Haru-chan, and Ren will miss Milad, and—”

“Nagisa!” cried Rei, tugging at his forelocks exactly as Rin was wont to do. “If you cease your crying and put on your gown and sit before the vanity so Momo and I may help you with your jewels, I will wed you before I depart to see my parents.”

Nagisa went still.

“Truly?”

“Aye, I swear it,” said Rei, watching wearily as the dancer brushed away the creases in his undergown and clad himself in a violet robe embroidered with rose and silver thread. Nagisa went to sit by the looking-glass without further complaint, where Momo set upon him with a bowl of water and a comb. Rei followed a moment later with the younger lad’s jewel-case, and at last all was quiet as Nagisa was readied for the day.

“Have we another wedding to see to, then?” asked Ren, who was sitting at the foot of Rin’s bed with Milad in his arms.

Haru thought wretchedly of the hours he and Rin had passed at the marketplace in the citadel, the days he had spent closeted in Makoto’s study, buried to the shoulders in gifts for the betrothal night. He would not look upon another bill of fare or burning-slip again as long as he lived, not even for Rei’s marriage—

He sighed, laughing softly as Rei procured a bottle of kohl from his pocket and proceeded to line Nagisa’s lashes with it, darkening the dancer’s skin with patience he had never possessed when it was Haru who sat before him. Sighing in relief at the sudden quiet, Haru clambered onto the tasseled bolters to sit with the children and took an ivory brush to Milad’s hair.

A pair of familiar voices broke upon their ears, and a moment later Makoto and Rin crept into the room. They stopped short at the sight that met them: Seijurou standing guard over Rin’s wedding slippers, Haru and the children perched upon the bed, and Nagisa sitting as still as a mouse by the looking-glass with Rei and Momo beside him. Makoto chuckled and went to the mirror over his chest of drawers to put on his own adornments, slipping hooks into pierced flesh and settling the heir’s diadem over his forehead.

“Are we ready to go down, then?” asked Rin, who was clad from head to foot in golden robes the color of Sakura’s eyes. His jewels were finer than anything Haru had seen upon him before—a heavy necklace of golden filigree, matching bracelets, and a chain of rubies redder than blood. He had upon his brow a circlet of his own, a simple gold band set with a crimson gem. Rin looked every inch the lord that he was, and Haru wondered at the tranquility that had overtaken the fiery man.

“Aye, in a moment,” said Rei, who took Momo’s brush and ran it over his own head. “I have your jewels with mine, Haru. Go put on your robe, and then I shall dress your hair.”

Haru went without a murmur, changing his yellow tunic for the gown of lavender satin that Aki had given him before his departure from Iwatobi. Rei knocked upon the door of the dressing room a minute later to clasp the pearl and amethyst belt about his master’s waist. The prince wore nothing upon his hands, but Rei had brought Makoto’s rope of pearls to hang upon his breast. A pair of matching earbobs were all that Haru had to wear besides the necklace, and when he emerged into the bedchamber again he saw that his ornaments were the simplest of the lot; even Rei had found a silver carcanet in Makoto’s jewel-box to pair with his betrothal ring.

The six men took the looking-glass by turns, assuring themselves that their collars were tidy and their faces clean, and after Milad was enticed into the spangled jacket that Nagisa had bought for him they set off for the gardens with Ren and Hayato in tow. Rei, Haru, Nagisa, and the Mikoshiba brothers made straight for the open temple overlooking the lotus pool, while Rin and Makoto remained in the entrance hall to await the bridal procession.

The better part of the cushions upon the floor were empty, for most of the guests had not yet left the palace. Haru seated himself upon a pillow close by the altar, watching Sakura’s parents ready the bowls for the fire. Dishes of rice and lentils stood close at hand, waiting to be poured as offerings into the flames. Left to himself to toddle between the guests, Milad spotted the dish of sweets and was halfway across the tile before Haru leapt to his feet and carried him away.

Beside them, Seijurou was beginning to cry again, and even Momo’s lip was trembling as they listened in for the bells of Sakura’s train.

“Don’t cry, nii-chan,” sniffed the lad, setting a hand upon his brother’s shoulder. “Everything will be as before—we will not lose her.”

“Nay, I am not weeping for that,” said Seijurou, drying his tears. “I fret for Sakura just as Rin worries for Gou, and to know that her husband will cherish her dearly is the greatest blessing I could have asked for.”

“Don’t you _dare,_ ” muttered Haru, who had glimpsed Nagisa fumbling in his girdle for a handkerchief.

By and by, the guests streamed into the temple. The sultan and queen arrived a quarter of an hour later with Lord Shigino and his wife. Hayato’s elder brother was absent; his wife had been taken ill before the betrothal feast, and so the two had given up their plans to travel to Qasr that autumn. A handful of soldiers and guardsmen came next, followed by Azar from the kitchens and the dancing troupe. Malka and Lili were not there, for they were waiting in the performance hall with Sakura and Gou.

At last the chatter died away, for the soft clopping of horses’ hooves was heard coming along the path between the flowerbeds. Makoto came before the pony, leading it by the bridle, and Rin sat like a king upon the gilded saddle behind him. He held the reins one-handed, waving jauntily to the gaggle of serving boys who had gathered by the pool to shout their congratulations. Rin dismounted by the steps and allowed his companion to escort him to his place under the velvet canopy, accepting a pair of kisses upon his brow as he knelt before Sakura’s parents. His duty done, Makoto bid farewell to his friend and made his way to the row where Haru sat with Rei.

“Sakura’s procession will be along in a minute, thank Heaven,” said the Qasrian, falling onto the cushion that Haru had saved for him.

The words were scarcely spoken before a strain of song drifted into the glade, and half the assembly shot to their feet and turned to see the bridal train approaching the temple. Sakura sat with a garland of orange marigolds in her lap, enthroned upon a sedan chair dressed with flowers, with Malka at her left and her sister-in-law at her right. Rin’s mother came before them, singing a wedding hymn with Lili beside her. Natsuko, Kaguya, and Kazumi were at the head of the party, scattering rosy petals over the tile as they went. The soldiers set Sakura down before the temple and raised her from her chair, and after bowing in thanks she passed like a scarlet vision between the guests until she stood beside her intended.

Moving as lithely as a queen of the fae, she placed the garland about Rin’s neck, and after he had bestowed one of his own upon her, she knelt upon her cushion before the fire.

Haru understood little of the ceremony, for it was conducted fully in the Qasrian tongue and he did not wish to trouble Makoto to repeat the prayers in the common speech. But at last the newly-wedded pair poured rice and grains into the dishes of fire and fed one another from the bowl of sweetmeats, and from the outcry of cheering that broke from the others Haru knew that the vows must have drawn to a close. The party broke for luncheon once Rin and Sakura were well and truly married, and as was the custom in Qasr they dined upon nothing more than the sacred fruits over which the bride and groom had received their blessings from the priest.

The merry-making spilled out into the gardens, much as it had done the day of Haru’s betrothal. Sakura and Rin were standing with Makoto’s mother and sorting the wedding gifts, while Seijurou and Momo directed an army of attendants to carry the presents away to Rin’s chambers. Rei and Nagisa were eating sugared apricots by the lotus pool, and the twins had escaped to the kitchen courtyard with Milad and Hayato to feast upon stolen blackberries. Having nothing further to do, Makoto armed himself with a platter of sweets and offered his congratulations to the bridegroom before joining Haru by the tulip beds.

“Where is the little one?” asked the Qasrian, passing Haru a square of colored marzipan.

“Raiding the kitchen gardens with Hayato and the twins,” chuckled his friend. “Do not worry, Makoto. They will return before long, I am sure.”

They spent the afternoon roving along the pebbled paths and talking together amongst the flowers, most of which were beginning to shrivel and drop their leaves for the coming winter. Haru felt a touch of melancholy at the sight of the wilting pinks and primroses, and recalled that he had spent nearly three moons away from home. The drought had begun in early summer, and Haru had passed the remainder of the season in Qasr. But summer had cooled into autumn, and the days were chill like standing bathwater in the half-light before the dawn. The leaves had begun to redden on the boughs, and while the prince had heard of such a thing he had never glimpsed it for himself before.

“What are you thinking of, Haru-chan?”

Haru looked up at Makoto, his gaze lingering upon the Qasrian’s gentle smile as if he were learning it anew. He had no cause to remain in the citadel by the elder prince’s side, not now that Haru had broken his engagement and put his beloved Iwatobi in peril again by betrothing Hayato to Ran. As her intended, he had had every right to dissolve the agreement, and not a soul would know the truth of it until Ran was of age to wed. He would come and go between the kingdoms as the years went by, spending a summer here and a winter there, but the quiet palace at the brink of the desert would never be home to him, and he felt his lip tremble at the thought.

“Haru?”

“I dreamt of Iwatobi last night,” he murmured, lying back upon the blanket with Milad on his chest. “Of Aki, and the tales he used to tell us in the evenings before we went to sleep.”

“What were they like?”

“Aki’s stories? He cherished the thought of gods descending to walk among men, of giving aid where it was needed and returning to the heavens without a thought of payment in return. He often said that he wished all men were so, that kindness could be given and received for its own sake and nothing more. He hoped night and day for a miracle, when the drought began—that his faith would not fail him, and at the eleventh hour his prayer was answered.”

“You love him dearly,” observed Makoto, tickling Milad’s dimpled cheek with a piece of golden straw.

_Iwatobi is all that fills my dreams of late._

“Aye, of course. He is my brother.”

 _T_ _he great reservoir at the heart of the citadel, the feasting court and the golden dunes, our chambers in the palace, and even Rei’s horrid scrubbing brushes..._

_I don’t wish to be parted from you, either._

_All the right of my House is thine._

“What is troubling you, Haru-chan?”

_Once, and no more._

“Do you recall—that I said I wished to make my home in Qasr, after Ran and I are married?”

_The cherished twain, and thrice for luck._

“Aye, I do. I could not forget such a thing.”

_Nine years ago, on your tenth birthday, you and the crown prince swore an oath to do all in your power to guard this kingdom and its folk._

“I feel as if my heart has been cloven in two, Makoto.”

_How you have grown, Haru._

It had been his mother who said it then, but the tender words seemed to repeat themselves in Aki’s strident voice, and again in Rei’s lilting tones, softened for ever by the steadying hand of the Qasrian speech. He was changed, he knew—not only by Makoto and Milad, but by the friends he had grown to love, by the sight of cloudy turrets blanketing the skies at sunset, by the gentle air that had yet to burn him from lips to lungs as he breathed at ease.

“But it cannot always be cloven in two, _amarya_ ,” said Makoto, resting upon his elbow so that he lay beside his friend. “Whatever it is, you will find a way to set matters to rights.”

“How can you be sure?” whispered the Iwatobian, turning to the elder lad and looking up into gentle eyes—eyes that seemed to pour their affection into his own like one vessel brimming over into another, an emerald river yielding its precious bounty to the arms of the thundering sea.

“Because you are good, Haru-chan,” replied the Qasrian, stooping to kiss his brow and then Milad’s. “Because you journeyed across the desert to live among folk you did not know for the sake of your people, because you love our Milad and Rei and Aki with all your heart. A soul such as yours is meant to be whole, and if you feel yourself torn you must be healed, with time.”

*          *          *

Haru hardly noticed the rest of the wedding-day as it slipped by, the belated joining of a pair of sweethearts who had loved one another for far too long. He had no recollection, in later years, of Nagisa springing up onto the temple steps and asking Rei for his hand in marriage again, nor of Hayato and the twins setting loose a cloud of fireflies to rove about the garden when Rin put the first spoonful of wedding-cake to Sakura’s lips. Neither did he remember Momo stumbling over a hollow in the grass and falling headlong into the lotus pool, or Gou shrieking in fury as Seijurou shed his overgown and dived in to fetch him out again.

But he recalled dancing through the evening across the terrace with Makoto’s hands in his, and lifting Milad up to rest upon his shoulder when the little lad grew weary. He remembered sitting with his mother by the banquet tables, and talking for an hour or more of home. Haru had wept into her robes as if he were a child of six again, and when she and Kaguya kissed him goodnight he found that he felt himself whole again, as Makoto had said he would.

He slept easily that night, stretched upon the silken sheets with Milad in the cot beside him, and when the morning of his mother’s departure dawned three days later Haru arose from his bed without a hint of grief. He would miss her, and dearly—but it would be only a little while before he was back in Iwatobi again, and the Nanase clan together as one.

“You must promise to write as often as you have been doing, Haru,” said Kaguya, who stood by the palace gates as she waited for a manservant to saddle her camel.

“Won’t you come home soon?” pleaded little Kashi, tugging at Haru’s robes. “It’s dreadfully dull without you, and nobody shouts at Aki now that Rei is here.”

“I shall, before you know it,” he answered, accepting his mother’s kiss and bestowing one of his own upon the little sentry at his knee. “And you will give Aki my sketch of Milad, and all the sweetmeats I sent, Mother?”

“Certainly, but I cannot be sure that Jun will let him eat them all,” laughed Kazumi, mounting her own steed. “Be well, my son, and we shall see you in the winter.”

And with that they were gone, the Princess and the Queen making their way through the town to the Qasrian border with thirty guards and a trading caravan from Ram-Susah, due to journey to Iwatobi next. Haru and Rei stood waving by the balustrade until the camels had disappeared between the dunes, and as the very last flagpole descended below the horizon Rei sighed and sank onto the sunny bench behind him.

“It was good, to have them here,” he said.

“Aye, and Kashi, too,” agreed Haru. “But we will be with them again before long.”

“And I shall be parted from Nagisa,” said Rei, looking desolately out upon the marketplace below.

“Will you truly wed him before we go?” asked Haru, perching lightly upon the seat beside him.

“I wrote to my father of our engagement the morning after your betrothal,” replied the steward, stretching until the joints of his shoulders began to crack. “The letter will reach Iwatobi either tonight or tomorrow, and there is nothing to keep me from it now.”

Haru nodded and turned back to the marble railing, resting his chin upon the warm stone as he blinked against the light. “We ought to go in.”

“Milad will sleep until noon, and I do not wish to stir,” said Rei, curling up like a cat upon the bench. “Nagisa will come and wake me before long, and I wish to have an hour of peace until then.”

The prince laughed and put out a hand to ruffle his friend’s hair. “Very well. The palace is chilly today, and we will lose the sunlight soon enough.”

They remained there for half an hour or more, conversing quietly upon this and that as the sun rose to its peak. Haru nearly burst into a peal of mirth again as Rei began to snore, recalling his foolish fear that the steward’s love for Nagisa would take his dearest friend from him.

As Haru sat idly upon the balustrade watching the townsfolk going about their business in the streets below, a sudden movement caught his gaze, no more than than a stirring speck in the corner of his eye. He frowned and stared out into the desert, watching as the object seemed to fling itself between the dunes, shining under the light like a piece of polished glass.

Haru sprang down to the tile, shaking his manservant by the shoulder until the man yawned and clambered to his feet.

“That is a camel and its rider, is it not?” asked the prince.

Rei nodded, squinting against the sun. “The rider is holding a mirror, I think, though I cannot imagine what he is doing with it.”

“Where could he have come from?” said Haru. “To be journeying from the east, and alone—”

The truth came to them with the force of a thunderclap, and as Rei stood rooted to the tile in horror Haru took to his heels and tore across the grounds to the palace, shouting into the entrance hall as he passed the doors. The guards at the city gates had realized that something was amiss, and a handful of men had saddled their horses and gone to meet the lone rider approaching the citadel.

As a double line of soldiers streamed out of the first-level practice ring with Makoto and Sei at their head, Haru felt as if the cheery morning had been plunged at once into shadow.

*          *          *

The guardsmen took no more than a quarter of an hour to ready themselves, and by the time they were armored and assembled in the courtyard, the rider had been brought up to the palace. It was none other than sixteen-year-old Phina, Kashi’s elder sister, and at the sight of the blood upon her gown, Rei had burst into tears. From her sobbing explanations, the sentries at the gate had gathered that a group of rogues on horseback set upon the caravan nearly four leagues from the citadel, and in the skirmish she had contrived to separate her camel from the others and return to the city for help. Haru had begged to be allowed to accompany the soldiers, but Seijurou had turned his back to the prince without a word and Makoto had shaken his head.

“You have not so much as lifted a sword since you departed Iwatobi,” he said, and refused to speak further of the matter.

Sei was passing between his men, barking out orders and directing them this way and that. Rin, Sakura, Nagisa, and Gou had come out to bid them farewell, and to his astonishment Haru found that Makoto had spared him no more than a passing glance after donning his helm and mounting his horse. He was glancing at Gou, who was wringing her hands and looking up at the prince as if imploring him for aid.

“Take care, Makoto,” whispered Haru, drawing back to Rei’s side as he had done the afternoon he arrived in Qasr.

Makoto’s eyes softened, and he stooped to brush his fingers over Haru’s tangled hair. It had grown long during his months away from home, and neither he nor Rei had thought to cut it.

“Of course, Haru-chan.”

Seijurou called out to the others, and as one they streamed through the gate and down to the marketplace before sweeping like a silver tide into the desert. The seven left on the terrace gathered together by the balustrade, watching the army recede into the distance like a wave withdrawing from the shore.

Gou wrapped her arms about herself and trembled where she stood, staring half-frozen after her husband like a lost soul. Rin came to her side and hugged her close to his chest.

“He will come back again, just as he always has,” he said, the surety of his voice belying the watery gleam in his eye. “You need not worry, my darling.”

Sakura joined them with soothing words of her own, and as the sun began its downward arc across the heavens they sat by the railing and awaited the soldiers’ return in silence.

*          *          *

“There!” cried Nagisa some two hours later, nearly flinging himself over the balcony as he pointed the stirring cloud of silver rising between the dunes.

“It is over, then,” muttered Rin, leaning upon the rail. “I pray none of them have fallen.”

“Those are not the helms, or I am much mistaken,” said Rei, shielding his eyes from the sun as he gazed out into the desert. “It is smoke, I think.”

“Aye, they are burning the bodies of the bandits,” answered Sakura, who still had her arm about her sister-in-law. “I wonder if the caravan will come back with them.”

She said nothing more, and as they held their breaths the silver seemed to deepen in hue until the first members of the cavalry rode into view before them. Haru loosed a shuddering breath and wiped his eyes, sinking back onto the bench to watch between the pillars.

Rin took his spyglass and peered at the approaching soldiers, who were swiftly growing sharper to his gaze as they drew nearer to the city gates.

“What of Sei?” asked Gou, tugging at his sleeve.

“I cannot tell,” said her brother. “None of the foremen are carrying his standard—perhaps he was forced to leave it.”

“And Makoto?” cried Haru, his voice rough with fear.

Rin did not reply at once, for the color left his pointed face as he looked into the glass again. “Sei is unhurt, Gou,” he said, “But he is carrying someone before him, and there is blood all down Khalifa’s side.”

“Who?” whispered Nagisa, holding onto Rei’s girdle for dear life.

“Take it, Haru,” said Rin, thrusting the spyglass into the Iwatobian’s hands. “Your eyes are sharper than mine, and I think—I am not sure, but—”

Haru snatched up the thing and put it to his eye, desperately scanning the line of soldiers until his gaze lit upon a familiar spired helm. It was the General, looking pale and wan as he steadied the wounded man in his arms. A riderless horse was making its way through the sands beside him, and as he saw the tousled locks of nut-brown hair upon Seijurou’s shoulder Haru let the glass fall from his shaking fingers with a cry. He had flown from the terrace before it shattered upon the tile, skimming lightly over the grass and down the marble steps until he passed the palace gates and descended into the town.

Once he had reached the streets below, he bent double and fought to catch his breath, realizing too late that he did not know the way to the border from where he was. But he could not return to the garden where Rei’s shrieks of dismay were billowing from the balustrade, where Gou’s stricken sobbing was mingling with that of her brother like a broken song. He remained where he stood, clinging to a post with tears streaming like a runnel down his nose. The townsfolk gave him a berth as wide as a wagon as they passed, for without his jewels and circlet they did not recognize him, and kneeling in crumpled robes by a tanner’s shop he seemed no more than a beaten madman as he wept beside the dusty road.

His heart thundered as if it would burst from his chest, and as he essayed to steady himself he thought of Makoto, Makoto with his sea-green eyes and tender smile, Makoto’s palms as rough as sackcloth, but smooth as silk when they brushed his own. He could not imagine the laughing curve of the rose-leaf mouth stilled in the frown of eternal sleep, nor the shining eyes lidded by the cruel hands of death. He could not imagine Makoto taken from him, and at once he began to fear the loss of his friend as he had never feared anything before. Haru choked back a sob and wiped his eyes upon his sleeve, trembling like a leaf as he listened for the approaching horsemen.

They entered the marketplace scarcely a minute later, the ponies stirring up a cloud of dust as they came. Seijurou’s horse came first, moving slowly under the doubled weight. Haru shot to his feet and began to run, seeing only that Khalifa’s white mane was matted with scarlet, and that Makoto’s silver armor had turned as red as rust.

He followed blindly as the cavalry swept by, and somehow—he could not recall when it had happened—one of the men lifted him onto his horse before him, and he was carried back to the palace with the rest. When the soldiers dismounted at the terrace, Haru saw dimly that Rin and the others had not been idle; an army of healers was waiting before the entrance hall, armed to the teeth with bandages and a long stretcher. Seijurou slid to the floor and lifted Makoto down behind him, carrying the senseless prince toward the doors before the healers took the wounded man from his arms and bore him away.

Haru stumbled toward the General, who reached for his wife and began to cry into her shoulder.

“A lance,” he choked, shaking as if stricken by a deadly chill. “One of the devils made to unseat me from my horse, and Makoto sprang between us and took the blow himself. The head smote in and vanished, Gou—I did not dare remove it, and I had to cut the thing in two to carry him back.”

“Where?” cried Rin, taking his brother-in-law by the arm.

Seijurou glanced up and touched his side with a bloodstained hand. Rei pressed his fist to his mouth, and Nagisa broke into a fresh round of sobs as the general’s fingers left a scarlet mark upon his mail.

“I must go to the twins,” said Haru, his hollow voice echoing through the courtyard like the cry of a mourning beast.

He turned away from the others and fled.

*          *          *

It was the worst night he had passed in all his life, Haru thought.

The chambers beside his were empty; the healers had taken Makoto to a room in the infirmary. The king and queen had gone to sit beside him the moment they heard of his return, but Haru and the rest were barred from the healing halls. The Qasrian had not awoken since he was wounded, they were told, and Haru crept from his own apartments to stand beside the bolted door as the head of the cruel spear was taken from Makoto’s side. He heard no more than a broken moan from his friend through that terrible quarter-hour, and Haru and Rin made their way back to the third level with tears smarting in their eyes.

When Rin opened the door to Haru’s chambers, they found the others gathered there; Gou lay upon a divan in the parlor with her head in Sakura’s lap, while Rei slumped over an arm of the sofa with Nagisa beside him. Momo was curled against his sister’s shoulder, and Seijurou lay flat upon the floor with a cushion over his face.

“Is it done?” asked Sakura, meeting Haru’s gaze with steady eyes. They were rimmed with scarlet still, as if she had been weeping for hours, but her voice did not quiver for so much as a moment.

“Aye, it is finished,” he said, falling into an armchair. “He was insensible to it all until the end, they said.”

A quiet sniff sounded from the corner, and as his eyes grew accustomed to the half-light of the candles burning upon the mantel he saw Hayato and the twins sitting together behind the divan. Haru went to them without a word, gathering the children into his arms as they cried into his collar.

“Will _onii-chan_ die, Haru-chan?” sobbed Ren. “Mother didn’t let us go in to see him, and Father looked so queer and lost.”

“He _shall_ get well, _shin'ainaru-ko_ ,” soothed Haru, wondering all the while from whence his resolve had sprung. “Makoto would not leave you for the world, and he will do all he can to remain by your side.”

“What if he can’t?” wailed Ran, laying her little face upon the prince’s neck.

“Do not speak of such things, my darling,” said Haru. “It is nearly midnight, is it not? The three of you ought to have been asleep long ago.”

“May we sleep here, Haru-chan?” begged Hayato.

“All of us ought to sleep here, if there is room,” said Sakura, smoothing back a lock of tangled hair from Gou’s feverish brow. “I do not think I can return to our chambers to-night—if there is news to be had they will bring it here, and we should be close at hand.”

The others exchanged weary looks of assent, and by and by they wandered off to find a place to rest. Haru and Momo settled themselves upon the bed in Haru’s room with the children, while Sakura and Gou took the one in Rei’s chambers with Seijurou and Rin. Nagisa and Rei were left with the divans in the parlor, and before long they were lost to slumber, each of them whispering a prayer for the life of their absent friend before silence descended upon the palace at last.

*          *          *

Some hours later, Haru found himself blinking in the rosy light of dawn, which crept over the embroidered tapestries like a breath of advancing frost. Momo was sprawled on the pillow beside him, and Hayato and Ran lay with their heads upon the young dancer’s stomach. Haru shot upright and looked about for Ren, sighing heavily when he saw the little lad curled up in the beribboned cot with Milad. He turned the opposite cheek to the bolster, uncertain what had woken him, until a second knock echoed softly at the door of the outer chamber.

Haru tumbled from the bed and hurried to the threshold in his stocking-feet, lifting the latch to reveal the queen standing alone in the corridor beyond.

“My lady,” gasped Haru, making her a hasty bow. “Makoto—”

She nodded, but there was little relief upon her careworn face. “He is asking for you, child.”

He nodded and bolted down the passage the way she had come, taking the stairs two at a time until he descended to the first level of the palace. Natsuko followed at a slower pace, and by the time Haru arrived at the the infirmary he had left his mother-in-law several paces behind him. He passed into the general ward, where Sakura had taken Nagisa for his twisted ankle the month before the betrothal night. A kindly healer gave him a pair of bedroom slippers and directed him to a shady alcove by the window, where the door to Makoto’s room was hidden behind a woolen curtain. Haru brushed it back upon its rod and let himself into the chamber, where the sultan slept at his son’s bedside with his head upon the nightstand.

Makoto was awake, looking hardly himself as he lay bare-chested upon the pallet with a swathe of stained bandages wrapped about his trunk from the point of his breastbone to his hip. The covers were tangled loosely upon his stomach, and as Haru shut the door behind him Makoto raised his head and essayed a bloodless smile, fluttering a pale hand at the trembling prince to beckon him near.

“Haru-chan,” he whispered, letting his wrist fall back to the sheet as he turned to face his friend. “Oh, Haru-chan, I am sorry. Forgive me, _amarya_ , if you can.” His shoulders quivered as if at the breath of a sudden wind, and before Haru took the queen’s empty chair he drew the blankets up to the Qasrian’s neck and kissed his drooping hands.

“Do not worry, my darling,” breathed the younger lad, feeling a sob rise into his throat again at the pallor of the prince’s skin. “How do you fare?”

“Poorly, or so the healers have said,” said Makoto, laughing weakly as he tipped his chin at the weeping rent in his side. “They cannot give me a better tonic for the pain, for having bled so the draught could take my life more easily than the wound itself.”

“How long will it be before you can take a stronger philter, then?”

“Not before the week is out, I was told,” chuckled the prince. “It is a pity that the rogues set their eyes upon your mother’s caravan, is it not? I was to attend court to address the Suhrian delegates at luncheon—they have grown discontented of late, and surely my absence will only needle them further.”

“Have you eaten at all?” asked Haru, taking Makoto’s palms between his own and rubbing them together until a measure of color returned to the icy fingers.

“I drank a cupful of broth, after I woke,” sighed the other. “But it was only an hour after they rid me of the lance’s head, and I was sick the moment I had finished it.”

“You must eat,” chided the Iwatobian, stooping to kiss Makoto’s hands again. “How will you grow strong again without a morsel of food to help you?”

“I will take another bowl of broth as soon as I am able,” he replied, looking away from Haru and down upon the counterpane. “I will need my strength, I am sure.”

There was a heavy promise in his words, and Haru glanced up in alarm.

“Why?”

“I had my wits about me, when the surgeons were conversing with my mother in the outer ward last night,” answered the Qasrian. “I will recover from the wound, they think, for the bleeding has begun to slow—but if I should grow ill as it heals—”

“We must take care, lest the fever should cross into his blood,” said a young healer who had entered with the queen. Natsuko looked like a half-mad creature, and from the wretched look of terror in her eyes Haru knew that his friend did not worry unduly.

“He is flushed already, and from the pace of his heart I fear the blade did more harm than we thought—but it had no time to fester, so we need not think of it yet.”

Haru scarcely heard the healer’s command that he ought to leave his friend to rest, nor Makoto’s words of farewell, for the sobbing catch of the queen’s breath haunted his ears like the mournful voice of a funeral gong. He made his way up to the third level upon trembling legs, and entered his room to find the others still sleeping under the golden rays of the rising sun.

The Iwatobian went to the ivory altar by the window in the parlor, upon which the soot of last night’s incense lay scattered before the bronze figures. He bent his head and marked his brow with the fragrant ash, whispering a plea for Makoto as he lit the prayer-lamps on either side of the Goddess.

 _If you have ever had an ounce of power, make him well again,_ he begged, looking into the idol’s emerald eyes—a near match for Makoto’s own, he thought—for all the world as if it might spring to life and heal the wounded Qasrian where he lay.

But there was no answer, and after a disheartened hour spent kneeling by the shrine ,Haru rose to his feet and went to wake the children for their breakfasts.

*          *          *

 

_Dearest Aki,_

_By the time my letter reaches home, you will have no doubt realized that your mother and the Princess did not journey with it. Their caravan was attacked by a group of bandits not far from the Qasrian border, and while none of our party was injured, I cannot say the same for the battalion that rode out to aid them. Makoto took a lance in the side for Seijurou, and he was sorely hurt. The wound was not a bad one, or so we thought at first—for although he nearly bled to death on the journey back to the citadel, the General was wise enough to leave the head of the spear in the wound, and so the healers were able to keep him from death._

_The weapon was taken from his side without a particle of trouble, but he awoke with a burning throat the following morning, and he has grown steadily worse since then. As I write, it has been a week since the attack, and after the third day he could not be made to eat so much as a crumb. It is only rarely that the healers prevail upon him to drink, and even then it does no good, for he is sick after swallowing his broth more often than not. I am greatly afraid for Makoto’s sake, for the fever has fallen into fits of raving that last an hour or more, and when Lord Matsuoka went down to see him last night, he did not recognize his advisor at all._

_But though he does not know Lord Rin, nor even Nagisa and Sei, he knows Haru and the twins, and their names and Milad’s are all that fall from his lips when the fevers come upon him. Haru has taken to crying himself to sleep and calling out for Makoto in his dreams, and I fear for him, lest the worst should come to pass. We would be robbed of a beloved friend, every one of us, and poor Milad would lose one who is dear as father to him. I have never prayed for a thing in all my years as I do for Makoto’s safe recovery, and Haru spends the better part of his days before the shrine now that the healers have barred him from the infirmary. Burn a knot of camphor for him each morning until you hear from me again, Aki—I have little faith in such things, for Mother always thought there was no sense in it, but our hopes at worship were never fulfilled unless you were the one to speak, and I have not forgotten it._

_Her Highness and the Queen will depart three days hence, with a Suhrian ambassador journeying to meet his bride in Iwatobi. There is little fear that they will meet with trouble again, for the number of their company is such that not a soul will dare to cross them. Expect them in the third week of Aran-manod, if all goes well. Tell our fathers that Haru and I are as well as can be in such a time, and tell mine that I have resolved to wed my betrothed before returning home._

_Ever yours,_

_Rei._

_*          *          *_

Haru made his way through the corridors to the infirmary as silently as a shadow, weaving between the servants like a sullen spectre as he went. Makoto’s delirium had all but ceased, and for the past six days he had lain in a drugged sleep, blind and deaf to all that passed about him.

There was no threat now from the wound that had begun the mischief, or so the healers had told him—it was nearly healed, and beyond dosing the Qasrian with a veritable flood of elixirs, there was little left in their power to aid him. But the powerful beating of the Makoto’s heart was growing steadily faint, and when Haru and the others were permitted to see him again they had broken into sobs—for the lines of sinew and muscle had shriveled away as if they had gone to fuel the ravenous fire that burned in prince’s flesh.

When Haru crossed the threshold of the healing halls, one of the younger apprentices bowed him through the outer ward and into the chamber where Makoto lay, pale and still as a marble effigy slumbering upon its bier. He had been freshly bathed and dressed in a clean tunic and trousers, and the sunbrowned hands were folded placidly upon his breast. The Iwatobian approached his bed and stooped to kiss Makoto’s cheek, sinking down into the broken chair beside the cot. He searched the silent face in vain for the vanished smiles he had grown to love, the tender looks that had never left him wholly, even while he slept. There was nothing of the watchful elder brother upon the prince’s brow, so often furrowed at the children’s foolishness, and not so much as a shadow of the faithful son about his lidded eyes. It was as if Makoto himself had been parted from the world of the living, and all who loved him were left behind to mourn his passing as his fallen body lay like a shuttered gate between them.

“You must not leave me, my heart,” murmured Haru, “You must grow strong again, and be brother and friend and prince to us all. We are no better without you than the tides without the moon, but of course you must know it is so _._ Milad cries himself to sleep if Rei does not slip him a posset, and Rin and Sakura have all but forgotten they are wed, grieving for your sake. Gou walks about the palace like a ghost, and Sei is wearing himself to the bone in the practice ring with his remorse.”

He paused.

“But Momo is as incorrigible as ever, and it puzzles the rest to no end. Perhaps I am not foolish for my hope, then—not unduly at least, I pray. I would rather be dead myself than see him somber, I think, and he comforts the little ones as if had been born a father. Malka would be pleased to know it, would she not?”

A lone tear fell from his eye and caught upon his lashes. Haru looked upon it in wonder; it was a beautiful thing, as round as a marble and twice as clear, hanging like a starry fruit above the curving bones of his face.

“You will have much to answer for, when you see fit to awaken,” he swore, thinking with a pang of the last night they had lain side-by-side in his vaulted bedchamber with Milad snoring between them.

He had spent the better part of the last three moons drawn into joy by the music of Makoto’s laughter, growing to worship the gentle voice as it fell upon his ear like a wavelet brushing the shore. But he had never known Makoto’s silence, and when no answer came from the sleeping figure before him, he bent his head to the prince’s tunic and wept.

 


	9. To Lose A Prince

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Qasr prepares for Makoto's death and a steward gives up his place.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ALL RETURNING READERS, PLEASE PAY ATTENTION TO THIS NOTE!
> 
> If you don't follow me on Tumblr or haven't seen the updated tags, please note that this story is being illustrated by the incredible alsas! All three existing works of art are in chapter 3; the latest is of Sakura!
> 
>  
> 
> [Sakura in the dancer's quarters](https://78.media.tumblr.com/e2808ea5d088347787c0aa16a89b675c/tumblr_ozzy7txp4Q1wcaxklo1_1280.jpg)

_ Dear Aki, _

_This letter shall not reach you until a fortnight after I write it, at least_ ** _—_** _how odd it is to know that all will be over when you slit the parchment, that we will be leaping about the Qasrian palace in joy or wandering the corridors with broken hearts when my sigil meets your eye. Rei has written already, and so you must know that Makoto lies on the brink of death from the fever of the wound he received when he rode to aid Mother’s caravan. We believed the wound was the worst of it, but once the pain traveled to his heart the healers knew that the fever had crossed into his blood. I knew little of the matter, and they would not answer me truly_ ** _—_** _they would speak to none of us, until the sultan and the queen banished us from the infirmary and conversed with them alone._

_ Hayato slipped in to listen while their backs were turned, and upon his return we found that there is nothing to be done for a fever of the blood _ **_—_ ** _ that it will burn him from within, and that save a miracle he will die. He was pale as snow, when they first gave him the sleeping-draft, but now his flesh is red with welts that arise without more than a quilt upon his skin. The healers had expected no more than a week of sweats after he was hurt, and that he would die swiftly if they continued _ **_—_ ** _ but yet they go on, and he lives. They do not know what ails him, for the wound is nearly healed and is cool to the touch. He ought to have been well by now, but still he slumbers on and cannot be roused. His heart beats but faintly, and grows weaker by the day. _

_ How I wish you were with us! I know I cannot stand to lose him _ **_—_ ** _ already I know it will be worse a hundredfold than Grandmother’s death, and if Qasr was nearer to Iwatobi I should have called you to me. He is the dearest friend I have ever had, and in the months I have known him I have grown to love him as fiercely as I love you and Rei, though perhaps I have no right to do so _ **_—_ ** _ Father would say it is unjust of me, to hold him as precious as you when we have been together all my life. But I care nothing for that _ **_—_ ** _ I could cheerfully die for his sake, if it would do him a particle of good, and give him the very heart from my breast if it could keep the life in his. And instead we must watch him linger between this world and the next, and all that remains in our power is to weep by his bed and implore the Goddess to return him to us. _

_ He would grieve so, Aki, to know how we ache to see him lying there, but he will never have a chance to know it! We have lost hope, every last one of us, and by and by the others have been making their farewells. Rin is himself no longer, for save Sakura and his family there is no one dearer to him than Makoto. And the children _ **_—_ ** _ our grief pales before theirs, all four of them. He is as the sun to them, and without him there is nothing _ **_—_ ** _ they cannot be whole without him, not even small Milad. Rei does his best to be my strength, as ever _ **_—_ ** _ only now he is the strength to us all. To think we were so happy a fortnight ago _ **_—_ ** _ that on the first of the month we were wrestling the sultan’s decanters away from Nagisa at the bridegroom’s night! All the world has changed, and when this is at an end we will have fallen from Heaven to the fiery depths of the earth. _

_ The queen is but a shadow of herself, but still she thinks of me, of all of us, and has offered to send me home with Rei once Makoto is gone. It will be too hard for me to remain here without him, she says, and it  _ shall  _ be hard _ **_—_ ** _ every corner of my chambers reminds me of him, and even the kittens that play about in the corridors have taken to winding about my ankles when I pass; Makoto was fond of them, and they seek me out in his stead. But I cannot leave while I am needed, for Hayato and the twins cling to me as they clung to him _ **_—_ ** _ and Nagisa cannot lose his betrothed so soon after losing a friend. _

_ I pray this letter finds you well, and Uncle and Father and Jun. I am sorry we had to leave you, Aki, for I have had Rei beside me all the while _ **_—_ ** _ I dare not think what it must have been to you, to lose us both for a quarter of a year. I think of you and of home nearly as often as I draw breath, even amidst all of this, and I know that Rei does, as well. Write me back soon, for your brothers long for your arms more now than ever. _

_ All my love, _

_Haru._

_*_ _*_ _*_

The days went on as usual in the citadel, for though Haru felt that the very stone of the palace ought to crumble to dust at Makoto’s plight, their duties did not cease. Seijurou returned to his men two mornings after the attack, training until both his back and the soldiers’ trembled from their labors. Sakura, Momo, and Nagisa went back to the performance halls and danced until their slippers were spotted with blood, for the ache of feet made to go too long on pointed toes was kinder by far than the tearing weight upon their hearts. Gou, who had grown thin and pale from worry, set her teeth and turned to her studies by candlelight, keeping Hayato and the twins to their own even when their tears washed the figures from their slates.

But the heaviest duty fell to Rin, who was forced to take the absent prince’s place in court. He sat beside the sultan from dawn until close to midnight, aiding the stricken father with the terrible work of setting matters in order lest Makoto should fall to his wound.

First was the grisly business of naming Ran heir to the throne in his stead, the paper signed but for the queen’s name, for she could not bear to look at the thing while her son yet lived. Then there were the letters, dozens upon dozens, announcing the advisor as regent to the Qasrian provinces in Makoto’s place lest Masoto and Natsuko should die before Ran’s coming of age. Haru penned these for him, for while Rin strove night and day to settle the passing of Makoto’s crown, he would not think of doing the work that his dying friend had done. Haru ached to do it himself, but he lightened the man’s burden as well as he was able.

“What is the proper address for the Suhrian viceroy?” he asked, as they sat across from one another in the candlelight. It was the tenth day after Makoto had fallen into his deathly slumber, and Haru’s fourth at working with Rin in the sultan’s library.

“That is the difficult one,” sighed the advisor. “They refuse to write in the common tongue, the lot of them **—** it ought to be  _ syd muhtaram,  _ for by birth I am but a minor noble.”

“Ought we to sign my name instead of yours, then?”

“If they had an ounce of wit between them, perhaps. Nay, among the Qasrian provinces they were the only ones opposed to your betrothal, for the royal families of the six kingdoms have not married among each other in nine generations at least.”

“What concern is it to them?”

“It  _ was  _ of little concern when Ran was promised to you as the second heir to the crown,” snapped Rin. “Now that we sit here announcing my thrice-accursed hide as regent to the whole of the country, you are betrothed to the crown princess **—** and if we should lose Makoto, you will sit upon the throne beside your wife and rule this land as sultan some day. They never wished for an Iwatobian king, and the news will be bitter enough without your seal upon the parchment.”

The quill slipped from Haru’s fingers, which had grown suddenly chill in the draft from the open door. How could he have forgotten, he wondered **—** that now his dearest friend clung to life by a hairsbreadth, Haru himself had become crown prince of Qasr in all but name.

“We must break the betrothal, then,” he whispered, thinking of the restless city that had nearly overthrown his own grandmother’s rule for an imagined slight, some years before he and Aki entered the court. Iwatobi had been all but ruined then, and he knew he could not watch the same befall the sunlit haven that Makoto loved so dearly. 

He seized the advisor’s arm, nearly upsetting the dish of ink at his elbow.

“Let her wed one of the nobles of the court when she is grown, as she ought to do. Surely the provinces cannot think of debt at such a time as this—not when Makoto—”

Rin shot him a scathing glance.

“Suhar is but one province, Haru. One cannot break an agreement made with twenty-nine delegates for the sake of a contrary thirtieth. And their city lies close to Martulah, so far that we need scarcely think of them. But with—with Makoto as he is, we must be cautious not to needle the viceroy’s court unduly. Take my sigil and the white wax by the candle.”

The prince’s hands trembled as they brushed the lump of uncolored tallow, for it was identical to the wax that had sealed the letters bearing news of his grandmother’s death and his uncle’s ascent to the throne twelve years previously. White was given for evil tidings alone, and as Haru melted the icy clod over the sputtering tapers and pressed Rin’s signet into the wax he felt as if the lance’s head had thrust itself into his own heart. 

*       *       *

The nights seemed endless, and after Rin and Haru parted ways at the door of Masoto’s study in the evenings, the advisor went back to his wife in their chambers, where the two spent an hour crying in one another’s arms more often than not. Haru returned to his own rooms alone, where Hayato, Milad, and the twins had already laid themselves upon his bed and fallen into slumber. Once he had shed his robes and donned a sleeping tunic, he betook himself to the desk in the parlor with the Qasrian grammar, for he would need to master the language to help Rin as he should. His writing-pads were filled with the unfamiliar characters, and when Nagisa remained late with the dancers, Rei sat beside his master to correct the drafted letters. The steward would have been overjoyed by such diligence in lighter times, but as it was Haru did not listen for a word of praise, and Rei never thought to give one.

When at last the bayberry tapers sank into pools of olive wax, Rei retired to his chamber; Nagisa had fled the dancers’ quarters to sleep beside him, troubled by cruel dreams without a steadying hand to clutch through the darkness. Haru often remained awake an hour longer, writing daily to his mother and to Aki despite the fact that caravans departed the citadel for Iwatobi no more than twice a week, at best. Once the lengthy epistles were signed and sealed, he crept into his bedroom and fell onto the bolsters beside Milad, sleeping heavily until Rei came to wake him shortly after sunrise.

And so the days went by, until nearly half a month had passed since Makoto stirred a muscle. They visited him in the evenings, taking it in turns to sit by his bed and whisper for a while of all that had passed since he fell into sleep. Momo never ceased to hope that he might awaken at the tender voices about him; after they departed the healing halls, the lad was often found in the kitchens, sniffling into Azar’s apron as she stroked his hair with tears upon her own cheeks.

Haru lingered in the infirmary long after the others had gone, working beside the healers as they bathed and dressed the slumbering prince and poured draughts of broth and tonic down his throat. He had grown thin over the past weeks, his powerful body shrunken until it was nearly as slender as Haru’s own. In the half-hour that passed between Rin’s departure and the queen’s arrival, Haru knelt beside his silent friend with his hand resting upon Makoto’s chest, counting his flagging pulse as if each beat would be the last. When Makoto’s parents entered the chamber, he bowed and went without a word; he knew how little right he had to stand by the elder lad, and that the Qasrians’ grief was worse than he could hope to bear.

Makoto remained much the same after the tenth day, and as he did not grow worse again the physicians began to hope he might awaken. It was as if life had been blown back into the children at the news; the twins were seen to smile again at last, and sensing his father’s joy Milad permitted himself to be bathed without protest. Their elders remained wary, for Makoto looked half-dead as he lay, and the healers had long thought that something more than either the wound or the fever was ailing him.

* * *

“Haru-chan?”

Haru glanced up from his half of the pile of letters he and Rin were to answer by nightfall. Rather than finishing his work in Masoto’s chamber, he had elected to sit in the schoolroom with the little ones. Ren and Hayato had grown weary of their studies and gone off to play with Milad long ago, and after the eleventh bell only Ran remained beside him.

“What is it, Ran?”

The little girl put down her piece of chalk and rose from her place, pattering round the corner of the table to lay her head upon his shoulder. “Will you leave us, when onii-chan does?”

He did not rebuke her for speaking of Makoto’s death; after all, she was wiser than Hayato and Ren, and had been little comforted by the last news from the healers. 

“I will remain here as long as you want me,” he promised, drawing her into her his arms. “I will stay the rest of my life, if you wish it.”

“I can’t lose you for my brother, Haru-chan,” she said. “Not you and onii-chan both.”

And again they wept together until they were spent, and the epistles to Martulah were blotted with watered ink where their tears had run down upon the page.

*       *       *

Three nights later, Masoto sent Haru and Rin to their chambers an hour sooner than usual, and having no further work to do Haru and the little ones went to the prince’s room and readied themselves for sleep.

“Will you tell us a story, Haru-chan?” asked Hayato, drawing the covers up to his chin as he lay. Haru often read them tales in the evenings, but since Makoto was hurt none of the four had heart for such things. Haru had no heart for it that night, either, but he had sworn to carry on for the sake of his absent friend, and naught could have kept Makoto from fulfilling the children’s wishes as long as he had a voice with which to speak.

“Aye, I would be glad to,” he answered, smiling softly as even Ran looked up over the quilt in interest. “What sort of tale should it be, then?”

“A happy one,” insisted Ren, nestling close to his sister’s side. “One in which all comes right, even if it does not seem so at first.”

Ran and Hayato exchanged a pair of heavy glances, and Haru attempted to recall the stories that Aki had told him in his youth. There were more than he could hope to number, tales of valor and daring and peril and love, of gods who descended to walk among men. None of them seemed the proper thing for that night, and at last he sighed and put his chin in his hands.

“Would you mind dreadfully if I told you a tale of myself and Aki and Rei, when we were young?”

They cried out in joy, for they had grown greatly enamored with his cousin through nothing more than the letters that Rei read out to them over the supper table, and little Ran nearly swooned when the steward brought out the portrait of the three of them that Haru had painted for Aki’s twentieth birthday, having heard the clamor from his own bedroom.

“He and Haru-chan could be twins!” she cried, poring over the minature until Ren tugged it away from her.

“Only he is taller, and a great deal more handsome,” said Haru, laughing as Hayato peered over the little prince’s shoulder and clamored to see it for himself.

“Nobody is handsomer than Haru-chan,” argued Ren. “Nobody but Papa and onii-chan. What is the story about, then?”

“Well, when Rei and I were but two years old, and Aki was seven, a little girl called Jun was brought to play with us in our nursery, and she was lovelier than the light of a summer dawn **—** as beautiful as a flame and twice as bold.”

“What did she look like?” asked Hayato.

“Her hair was the color of polished mahogany,” smiled Haru, recalling how Aki’s gaze had never left her while she was beside them, following the dancing locks wherever they went. “And her eyes were as dark as the earth after rain, and in them there gleamed a spark that none of us could have hoped to match…”

*       *       *

“Haru!  _ Haruka! _ ”

The cry was accompanied by a flurry of pounding at the outer door, waking the sleeping Iwatobian in a moment. Haru shot bolt upright in his bed, flailing amidst the tangled sheets and striking Ren, who lay beside him. He fumbled for the book of matches upon the nightstand and lit a candle, taking it in hand and stumbling over Milad’s fallen robin as he hastened to the parlor. He heard a shaking breath on the other side of the lath, and his heart fell almost to his slippers as he lifted the latch and opened the door.

Rin stood alone in the corridor beyond, his chest heaving with sobs, his eyes scarlet and swollen so that Haru wondered how the advisor had come to his chambers unhurt. He held a dying lamp in his hand, and as the dancing flames guttered in the draft, the anguish upon the Qasrian’s face was made as plain as day. A sickening chill of terror stole into the prince’s veins at the sight of him, and as the elder lad crumpled across the threshold into his arms, Haru glimpsed the trembling of his shoulders and felt as if he would scream.

“It will b-be tonight, they say,” wept Rin, his pallid cheek soaking Haru’s robe at once. “He will not last until morning **—** his mother and father told me to fetch the rest, so we may bid him farewell **—** ”

Haru stepped back and pressed his fist to his mouth, muffling a cry as he bit down upon his fingers. There came the sound of hurrying footsteps behind them, and he turned to see Rei, who looked but once at the tears upon their cheeks and fled back to his own chamber to wake Nagisa. Haru sank to his knees upon the icy floor as Rin passed on into his bedroom to rouse the children, and at the chorus of stricken moans that broke from the inner apartment he covered his ears and wished with all his might never to hear the sound again. 

No more than five minutes later Rei had wrapped a shawl about each of the three small figures, bundled Milad into his little blanket, and hurried them out of the apartment and along the corridor to the first level. Gou, Momo, Sakura, and Seijurou drew up behind them, each looking as if they could not grasp what had befallen them despite the heavy sorrow of the last fifteen days. They clung to one another as if to life itself, Rin to Sakura and Nagisa to Rei, while Ran, Ren, and Hayato slipped their hands into Haru’s and passed on through the palace beside him like a group of spectres in the somber night.

When at last they came to the infirmary, an attendant bowed them across the threshold and into Makoto’s room, where they saw at once why Rin had been sent to summon them. The prince was mired in his silent sleep no longer, for he panted against the sweat of a fresh agony as if he had been wounded anew, the whites of his eyes gleaming under the torchlight as his lashes fluttered back and forth across them. His head lay in his mother’s lap, and she wept as she called his name, smoothing back the sunbleached locks from his brow. He sighed uneasily at her touch, the sinews of his jaw rising like restless serpents before they stilled and vanished back into his flesh.

The sultan sat beside his wife, looking desperately at his son’s face as if searching for the cheerful little lad of bygone years, the lad that had stood well and strong before him until only a fortnight ago. He whispered the boy’s name as if the word would reach him where the mother’s cries had not, and amid their sobbing the children joined his plea from where they stood half-frozen by the door. But Makoto was senseless to their voices, beloved to him as they were—as he had been for days, and though his eyes flickered open every now and then it was plain that he did not look through them any more than he had done when they were shut.

“Thank Heaven you are here, my darlings,” choked the queen, beckoning them near as they knelt in a ring about the cot. “He loves you so dearly, all of you **—** hold on to him as best you can, until the end.”

They did as she said, Ran and Ren crawling up onto the pallet to lay their faces upon their brother’s neck, while Rin and Seijurou each took one of his hands. Haru and Rei took the bench by Makoto’s feet, for the others had the higher right to be near to him than they. Hayato sat between Haru and Sakura, unwilling to leave the comforting hands that so kindly steadied his own. 

The prince was stirred to motion now and again, though as ever he turned in the writhings of unconsciousness, and still he did not know a single one of them. The Qasrians stifled their tears upon the shoulders nearest them as they watched his breathing grow weaker, from the sultan down to little Milad, who seemed to know what was passing before him as well as any of the others. Haru sat like a marble figure at the foot of the bed, his eyes as dry as the whispering dunes of the desert, not moving a muscle as he gazed upon Makoto’s face.

It seemed little more than a cruel dream to him, as if in a moment he would awaken to find himself in his chambers with Makoto slumbering beside him, or arising after a troubled sleep in the bed he had shared with Aki and Rei in his youth. He blinked as Nagisa buried his face in Rei’s gown, wondering how it all could end so **—** how such goodness could perish while wickedness endured, how fate could be so unkind to small Milad as to strike him twice, how it was that he had made the dearest friend of his life only to lose him three moons later.

_ You must not leave me, my heart!  _ he cried in silence. He grasped Makoto’s long toes beneath the coverlet, as if by doing so he might catch the fleeing spirit and keep it tethered by his side.  _ You must live! _

Makoto gasped as if in pain, and with a pang Haru realized that wherever he lay, far beyond their reach as he was, the agony of the fever had not left him **—** he had lived his last days deaf and blind to all who loved him, knowing nothing but the terrible fire smouldering in his blood, and at the thought Haru trembled like an autumn leaf readied for its death.

His eyes began to sting as he remembered Makoto as he had been **—** standing before him with hands outstretched to his own on the night of the welcoming feast, dancing beside him in the desperate prayer he had trodden time and again across the sands of the Iwatobian desert, hoping beyond hope that the drought would draw to an end **—** Makoto’s gentle face frightened beyond measure as it hovered above his own,  Makoto’s satin gown dark with water on the day he thought that Haru had drowned himself in the bathing chamber **—** Makoto lying upon his bed with a chuckling Milad on his chest, kissing the child’s hands and coaxing him into slumber with the golden melodies of a Qasrian lullaby. They went on and on, spanning only a handful of days, but seeming to lighten even the dreariest afternoons of his childhood with the rosy colors of coralline silk and laughter—cherished recollections priceless beyond measure, and doubly so now that there would never be another to grace them.

The last word had passed between them both, the last night spent slumbering together with Milad, the last afternoon of poring over letters of state in the study, the last careless hour of splashing in the bathing pools with Momo and Rin,  the last tender look that each had sent the other over the supper table with Ren and Ran and Hayato beside them.

Haru felt Rei shift upon the bench to his left, and the next moment he was flung onto the icy tile as the steward sprang to his feet, knocking Nagisa into Momo as he tore himself from the arms of his betrothed and turned on his heel to flee the chamber. The dancer struggled upright and looked about in astonishment, his eyes growing wide as Rei ran into the outer ward and shouted for a healer. Haru dropped Milad into Sakura’s lap and rushed to follow, finding his manservant shaking an apprentice by the shoulders. Rei’s eyes were brimming with terror and hope at once, and at the sight his master stopped in his tracks as if he had been struck dumb.

“The lance’s head?” said the poor fellow, wriggling away from the steward’s grasp. “Aye, we laid it aside in a cupboard that day **—** what could you want with such a thing?”

“Bring it here to me!” commanded Rei. “If I am right, His Highness may yet have a chance **—** don’t stand there gaping like a fool! Fetch it at once, or the prince’s death will be upon your hands alone **—** _ go! _ ”

The boy made him a clumsy bow and fled, stumbling into another room and rushing back to the steward with a wooden box and seven of the senior physicians, who ran out to see what the commotion had been. Haru’s ear caught the sound of hurried footfalls behind him, and he turned to see that Nagisa and Rin had left the room, gripping one another’s hands as they stared at Rei.

“He may live?” whispered Rin, pressing Nagisa’s fingers until the younger lad squeaked in protest.

“Aye, he might,” said Rei, taking the box from the lad. He raised the lid to reveal the thing that had done the mischief, a notched grey barb some four inches long. The steward laughed in relief and lifted it from the box, bringing it down upon a long counter lined with jars of salve and tinctures. It cracked in his hands, a slender point of metal breaking from the head and skittering away down the table. Rei cried out as if he could not believe what it was he had seen, and he swung around to look at the others.

“Look!” he said. “The barb was sharp, but brittle, and so it broke when I struck it.” He held it up to them, and Haru saw that a line of narrow teeth had taken shape upon the fractured edge like a row of tiny daggers.

“What of it?” asked the apprentice.

Rei hissed in impatience. “Do you not see? When he was stabbed, another piece must have cloven off in his flesh **—** and when the barb was taken from his side, the fragment remained behind. The weapon is meant to kill an enemy even if the marksman is too weak to deal a death-blow **—** the blade breaks beneath the skin, and the bit that is left burrows inward until it has finished its work.”

“That is why he is in pain,” whispered Haru. “His wound is growing deeper from within, though it has healed from the surface.”

“That is the right of it,” said the steward, exhaling heavily as the healers exchanged determined glances. “You will need to open the stitching and fetch it out, and then he will surely get well **—** if he has not been hurt beyond mending already.”

For the life of him Haru could not have recalled the events of the next two hours **—** but after Rei delivered his address the surgeons went to fetch a kettle of hot water and a tray of slender knives, and as Nagisa, Sei, and the rest gathered in the corridor outside the infirmary, they looked to one another in desperate hope. Masoto and the queen remained alone in the outer ward, observing the procedure through the drawn curtain to Makoto’s room.

“However did you think of such a thing?” asked Seijurou, holding Gou close to his side as he looked at Rei in wonder. “I have studied weaponry all my life, and I had never heard of a blade like that one until tonight.”

“Aki studied it more avidly than you, I am sure—he was fairly mad for it, and he always recited his lessons to me in our childhood so he might recall them better,” said Rei, wringing his hands as he and Nagisa pressed their ears to the bolted door. “It was only that Makoto seemed to be suffering as one newly wounded, and I did not come down to visit him as often as the rest of you **—** and so when I saw him again I knew he had not healed at all.”

“Do you think it is too late?” cried Ran, tugging at the steward’s robe. 

“I cannot say,” muttered the steward. “The notched tip must be where the piece was broken, and from the size of it he has a chance, perhaps **—** but if it has gone too deep there may be no saving him.”

They waited in silence, speaking only to comfort one another as the hours went by. By and by they grew tired of standing and sank down to rest against the wall, huddling together for warmth against the lingering chill of the early morning. At last a flush of red and gold flickered upon the pallid marble to the east, long after Momo and the children had fallen into slumber—and once the folk of the palace began to rise for the day, one of the elder physicians came to unbolt the door at last. 

Haru shot to his feet, grasping the hapless healer by the arm and shaking her as Rei had done to the apprentice in the outer ward. She paid him no mind, turning instead to Rei and smiling as if she had never looked upon a lovelier sight in all her days.

“You were not mistaken, my lord,” she said. The others cried out in relief as Rei began to shiver where he stood, clutching at Nagisa’s shoulder to steady himself. “We found the splinter, as you said we would, and now it is gone he will have a chance to heal if the fever has not drained him too greatly.”

Their shouts rang up and down the passage, and before they were sent to their beds again they were permitted to see him. He had not woken yet, for he had been given a strong philter for the pain of the knives, but already they could see that his breathing was slow and deep, and that the pinched death-look had gone from his nose and brows as if it had never been. They sobbed for joy as he sighed in his sleep, and Masoto and Natsuko fell upon the steward, thanking him until they had lost their wind and Rei’s ears were as red as wine. He stammered at their praises, and at last Ran and Ren heard the fuss and awoke to blubber into the lad’s shirtwaist.

“Rei-nii-chan!” cried Ren, clinging to the manservant and tugging at his sash. “You saved him! You saved him!”

“Rei-chan!” wailed Hayato, holding  Ran’s hand like a lifeline as his tears fell thick and fast down his cheeks. Neither of the lads said so much as a syllable more, and the little princess was weeping so that her speech could not be heard at all.

A heady feeling stole at length into Haru’s very bones, one he had never known before **—** joy and grief and love and pain mingling together as he looked at Rei, Rei whose keen eyes missed nothing, whose gentle hands had smoothed away the foolish aches and passions of his childhood, who saw no trouble before him without devoting all his thought to mend it, Rei who had returned in a single moment the soul that Haru held most dear upon that earth **—**

The moment the twins released him, Haru sprang forward and into his arms, nearly knocking the manservant off his feet as he struggled to bear his master’s weight.

“Haru, slowly!” he panted. “You are dreadfully heavy, and **—** ”

“ _ Be silent! _ ” shouted the prince, holding his friend so tightly that Rei began to flail in his grasp like a fish upon the hook. “Oh, Rei! Rei! _ Rei! _ ”

He cried the steward’s name until he was spent, at last collapsing upon his neck and weeping like a child wakened from a frightened sleep by well-beloved hands. Haru remembered nothing further after that, only the strength of familiar arms as he was lifted up to rest against a sturdy shoulder and carried like a babe to his chambers on the third level. When he rose again, he was alone in his bedroom but for Milad babbling to his poppet on the eiderdown beside him **—** and Rei sitting in an armchair by the window, smiling upon him with such lightness in his gaze that Haru knew all must be well at last.

When he saw that the prince was blinking wearily up at the vaulted ceiling, Rei laughed and came swiftly to his side, drawing back the covers and handing him a set of violet robes.

“Dress and go down to the healing halls,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ ,” he said. “And swiftly, for he is asking for you.”

*       *       *

Makoto was sitting propped up on a veritable mountain of pillows, clad in nothing but a pair of trousers so as not to disturb the fresh layer of bandages wrapped about his stomach. He glanced up when Haru flung himself across the threshold, and the sunken face shone with such happiness that the younger lad stumbled forward to lay his head in the prince’s lap and burst into tears.

“Makoto,” he sobbed, wrapping his arms about the frail shoulders as if they might vanish from his grasp if he dared let them go for an instant. “Oh, Makoto **—** I thought you were lost to me **—** that I should never see you again **—** ”

“Haru-chan,  _ amarya _ ,” whispered Makoto, bending as best he could to kiss Haru’s brow again and again. “Oh, my darling, I am so sorry.”

“Nay!” cried the other. “It is I who should be sorry **—** I ought to have known what ailed you, for Aki had told me of such weapons, and if not for Rei you would have been a corpse by dawn! You would have died last night, without him, and if I had not spent half my life running away from my lessons you might have been saved the very day you were hurt.”

“Aye, but I live,” said Makoto, wiping the tears from his cheek. “And I will get well again as soon as I have had some nourishment. They expect me to be up on my feet no later than to-morrow, I think.”

“How do you fare?” asked Haru, just as he had done the morning after the skirmish in the desert.

“Much better,” sighed the Qasrian, brushing his wasted fingers through his friend’s limp hair. “I finished off all the broth the healers put before me when I woke **—** I have never known such hunger in all my days.”

“You have not eaten for more than a week,” Haru pointed out. “And you have grown as thin as a reed. You must have meat, or you will waste away until you are as small as Nagisa.”

“I must wait until my stomach is strong enough to bear it,” laughed the prince. Makoto sobered again at the damp gleam in Haruka’s eye, and opening his arms he drew him to his chest.

“I cannot forgive myself for the pain I gave you,” he murmured. “I did not know I was so near to death, when I knew anything at all **—** there was only the heat of the fever, and I heard your voices now and again while I slept, as if from a great distance.”

“You must never do so again,” Haru vowed. “You will keep safe for the rest of your days, if I have to bind you to a chair to make it so! How could you have thrown yourself before the lance as you did?”

“I could not have let Seijurou die,” said Makoto solemnly. “The blow would have been a worse one for him than it was for me, and I had sworn to Gou that I would not let him fall **—** at any cost.”

Haru frowned.

“To Gou?” he said, puzzled. “What in Heaven’s name for? Do you and he not fight together often, that you should have given her such a promise that day?”

“She spoke rightly,” countered the other. “For when we ride to battle he takes better care of me than of himself, and everybody from Rin down to Hayato knows it to be so. He might have acted rashly, had I been in danger. Surely he would not have thought to turn so that the lance pierced his side and not his heart, if he were the one wounded—and that would have been the end of him.”

“Aye, I suppose that is true,” admitted Haru. “When will you return to your chambers?”

“Within the week,” promised Makoto. “I will have to be careful of walking, or so the physicians have told me, for lying abed so long will have taken most of my balance.”

“I can hardly believe that you are here, speaking to me thus,” confessed the Iwatobian, taking Makoto’s hand. “I dreamed of it night after night, and every morning I awoke to remember that you had not stirred for days, and that nothing was as it should be. It grew worse when I sat in your father’s library with Rin, for I could not forget it was your work I was doing.”

“Rin tells me you aided him as he took my place in court,” said the Qasrian, his eyes shining with tender regard for the drooping boy before him. “That you wrote to all the delegates beside him, and studied their dialect and customs night and day so you would be of help.”

“It was little to what he did,” sighed Haru. “My grasp of the Qasrian tongue is none too keen even now, though it has been better of late.”

“I could not thank you as you deserved if I tried for the rest of my days,” laughed Makoto, lacing his fingers with Haru’s as he lay back upon the pillows. “Here I have given you so much grief, and you have been naught but a blessing to me.”

“We sent off nearly half the letters, but there is still a boxful for the Haifan court in the study,” said the younger lad, a grin rising to his mouth. “Rin and I will need to write to them all again now that you live, thank Heaven, but before that I shall take a book of matches and burn all the notes that remain. What say you to that, Makoto? Will you join me?”

“Mother would like it better, I think, for I could not burn a letter of yours no matter what word it bore—and certainly not one you labored over with nobody but Rin for company.”

Haru snorted. 

“I deserve an honor for that, surely,” he muttered. “I had more inkwells thrown at me than I could count, and twice he nearly struck me deaf with his shrieking.”

“Shall I speak with him? He had no right to treat you so.”

“Nay, he worried more than the rest of us put together, and it was nearly more than he could do to keep from weeping in your father’s presence. He would not have managed it if I had not been with him, I think, and to see him so would have broken your father’s heart. Has he been to see you after we woke?”

“Sakura has,” replied Makoto, who seemed to be drifting back into slumber where he lay. “The lot of you were up past dawn, and excepting Rei and Sakura I expect the others will sleep until noon.”

“My lord, you ought to leave His Highness to sleep,” chided a healer, slipping into the room with a plate of mackerel broth. “He has been ill for many days, and he must rest before he can heal.”

“There is no need,” protested the prince, frowning as she set the dish before him and pushed Haru out into the general ward. “We have not spoken in weeks, and—”

“Sleep, Makoto,” ordered Haru, darting back to his friend’s side to bestow a kiss upon his brow. “I will not have you talk if it wearies you, or the fever will return.”

“Oh, very well,” murmured the other, his eyes falling shut almost before Haru had crossed the threshold again. 

* * *

“Haru? Haru, get up at once—you have lain abed all morning. Are you ill?”

The prince squinted up at the pale shape above him, and after a moment of hurried blinking Rei came into focus, standing against the light of the early afternoon. 

“No, I am not ill,” he sighed, batting his steward away and pulling the coverlet up over his face. “But I would sleep for an hour longer, if I may. Where is Milad?”

“Gou took him to visit the General in the practice-ring,” said Rei. “They will return before long.”

“And the children?”

“At the performance halls with Nagisa,” replied the manservant, drawing the  curtains as Haru wrapped his arms about a satin bolster and drew it to his chest. “I  _ will  _ wake you for luncheon, Haru, for you must meet Lord Rin after that to write to the provinces.”

“Must I?” groaned Haru, his voice muffled beneath his quilt. He fell silent, and the next instant he shot up from under the covers and fixed his friend with a beady stare. “Did Makoto wake again after I left him?”

“He was given a sleeping draft with his breakfast,” answered Rei, smothering the fire as he made to return to his own room. “Masoto and the Queen are with him now, if you wish to see him.”

“Nay, I will not trouble them,” he said, shutting his eyes upon the chamber as he sank once more into dreamless slumber. 

* * *

_ He stood by the east wall of the feasting-room, watching the guests mill about the floor. They chattered in their eagerness as they passed between the quieter members of the court; Rin and Sakura stood arm-in-arm as they spoke with one of the elder lords of Martulah. Makoto smiled as the advisor nodded in his direction before turning back to Lord Iman, and as he looked about the hall his gaze lit upon a young man nearly as tall as himself, with brown hair and eyes the color of tea unsweetened by cream. The prince frowned, for the lad resembled small Ren so strongly that Makoto could swear he must be kin to them. As he watched, the boy hailed a young girl sailing through the crowd upon her father’s arm and put his head to the side as she stretched out a hand to greet him.  _

_ Makoto gasped, for the motion had been the very picture of his brother. Ren and Ran were wont to do the same, and surely— _

_ “Lord Ren!” cried the maiden, blushing as he bent to kiss her fingers. “We had not expected to see you back so soon.” _

_ “Suhar was not nearly as contrary as my brother expected,” he laughed. “There was no need to remain another week, and so I took my pony and a handful of guards and ran back home again.” _

_ “You did your duty honorably, Highness,” said the girl’s father, making Ren a short bow.  _

_ “I thank you, Lord Khais,” answered Ren. “Will you accompany me to supper, Aina?” _

_ “But of course—may I, father?” _

_ They moved off together, and in the blink of an eye they were gone, lost among the laughing guests.  _

_ Makoto searched the chamber in growing worry, for he could not make sense of it—how Ren was no less than five or six years older than he ought to be, old enough to be sent to Suhar alone and to go courting— _

_ “Papa!” _

_ He heard the cry as if he had waited for nothing dearer all his life, and when he turned he fell to his knee to catch the little body as it flung itself headlong into his arms. It was Milad, as black-haired and green-eyed as ever, clad in a red and silver robe that Makoto recalled dimly as having rested in his own cupboard during his childhood. He looked to be six years old, or perhaps seven, and as he beamed up into Makoto’s face the puzzled father knew he looked upon a dream. It was said from Haifa to Martulah that his mother had the Sight, after all—perhaps by some trick of fate he had received it from her, able to live a day to come when the need was great.  _

_ Such was his astonishment that he did not hear the excited words Milad whispered into his ear, and he felt as if he had suffered a heavy loss when the boy wriggled free of his hold and ran between the General’s legs towards a woman standing alone on the balcony by the twin thrones at the front of the room. _

_ She was beautiful, he thought—lovelier even than Sakura and Gou, from what he could glimpse of her. Her hair was darker than the hour before dawn, and half of the inky mass was bound into a great rope that hung past the small of her back, The silver diadem of a crown princess—the smaller, lighter double of the one Makoto wore—shone upon her brow, and as she looked out over the water he saw a child slumbering in her arms with its head upon her shoulder. Makoto felt the breath plucked from his lips as he gazed upon the stately figure, for having seen her moonstone coronet he knew it could be naught but the woman he would some day take to wife. He frowned again, for his mother had been adamant that he should wed only a princess, a lady as highly born as he, and he knew well enough that the one he seemed to have married could be only a noble of the court at best.  _

_ As he watched, Milad bent his knees and sprang at her, his slender limbs curled into a poor imitation of a pouncing lion. Makoto rose to call out a warning, for the sake of the sleeping baby on the woman’s shoulder—but stopped as she threw out an arm and lifted him onto her hip, steadying the children with fluid grace as she rocked the smaller of the two back to slumber. The little lad turned to him again, calling his name and waving so that he nearly upset his guardian— _

_ Makoto felt as if his heart had stopped in his tracks, for standing clearly against the scarlet silk of Milad’s robe was a sprig of mourning hemlock, worn in Qasr to honor a death until five years after the soul’s passing. He looked down at his own bosom and saw an identical one below his collar, shining upon his yellow tunic like an emerald against the sun. Makoto turned away from Milad and looked desperately about the hall, finding his parents conversing with a pair of delegates as they sat upon the throne, Gou dragging Momo and Nagisa away from a decanter of raspberry wine. But no matter where he turned he could not see Hayato or Ran, and at the thought that they had departed the earth he felt his stomach bubble in dread. He had crept away to the edge of the crowd to search for them in the corridor when the double doors opened again, admitting the missing youths and Rei trailing along at their heels with a disgruntled look upon his pointed face.  _

_ Makoto laughed in relief, pressing his fist to his breast and nodding to Rei as he passed by. He glanced over the steward’s shoulder for Haru, but after Rei had crossed the threshold the doors fell shut, and no black-haired prince had come behind him. He too bore a sprig of hemlock on his chest, though none of the others did, and Makoto was struck with a sickening fear of whom it might be for.  _

_ But Milad was darting to his side again, leading Momo by the hand, and as he took the child into his trembling arms he listened for the high-pitched voice as he had never listened to anything in all his life before.  _

_ “Uncle says he will take me to visit Mama’s grave, since you cannot,” he said soberly. “Uncle Rei will walk with us—may we go, Father?” _

_ A reply left his lips, but he could not hear it, for he knew at last for whom the weeds were meant—and as Milad slipped away from him between the guests he cried Haru’s name into the darkness until his throat was torn and aching.  _

_*_ _*_ _*_

“Makoto! Makoto, sweetheart, you are safe—awake, darling, I am here—”

The prince wondered idly who was shrieking like a gutted beast in the healing halls, but as his mother’s worried face bent itself to his he understood that the dreadful noise was pouring from his own mouth. He shut it hastily, gasping at the pain in his throat as the queen rushed to the nightstand and poured out a goblet of water. 

“Oh, my son, I thought the fever had returned,” she fretted, putting a cool hand upon his brow and wiping the sweat from his cheeks. “You ought not to sleep for so long, for evil dreams come easily when you lie abed too late.”

“Aye, it was an evil dream,” he croaked, drinking until the water ran down upon his chin. “As evil as death and clear as day. I knew it was falsehood, and yet I could not quell the horror of it.”

Natsuko frowned and resumed her seat, watching the drops roll down his neck. 

“Mother—” he began, setting the cup upon his father’s empty chair. “The dreams you had in your youth—of meeting Father before you were betrothed to him, and the one of the lotus leaf and the violet lily—how did you know they spoke of matters yet to come?”

“I did not, at first,” she answered, wetting a small sponge and cleaning the damp from his chest and shoulder as he lay. “But after enough of them had come and gone I recognized that such dreams were always the same. I knew myself to be slumbering shortly after they began, and they were as plain and bright as life—and when they were over I recalled them just as I recalled the day before. Was this such a one, my heart?”

“Yes,” breathed the prince, hissing at the sudden ache as her fingers brushed the bandage at his side. “At least—it was unlike any dream I have ever known, and I felt knowledge to be truth as one rarely does when slumbering.”

“What befell you while you slept?” asked his mother, her sponge stopping in its tracks as she searched his eyes for a hint of what he had seen. 

“I was at a gathering in the banquet-hall,” he murmured, shutting his eyes as she went on with her work. “I thought nothing was amiss, at first—but then I saw Ren with one of the ladies of the court, little Aina, and he was many years older than he ought to have been—I would not have put him at less than seventeen.”

“Courting at such an age, when you have been slower than a tortoise yourself?” she chuckled. “And your sister?”

“She was well, but she wore her betrothal ring no longer,” said Makoto, who had realized the fact only after waking. 

Natsuko paused and set the sponge aside. 

“What of you?”

“I was wed, I think,” he said, allowing a shuddering breath to curl past his lips as he recalled the woman standing upon the balcony. “But I did not recognize my bride—she may be a foreign maid, perhaps—and we had a child, although I could not tell whether it was a son or a daughter, for the babe could not have been more than three or four months old.”

His mother’s eyes were wide with worry, and she made as if to rise before sinking back to the chair again. 

“Rei and Nagisa were married, for Rei was wearing the seal of the Hazuki clan.” At this Makoto’s throat grew thick, for he could not bear to tell her of the last—as if bringing it to speech would strike the dreaded blow, and the queen took him by the shoulders and looked at him with a face as white as salt. 

“And what of Prince Haruka?”

His chin quivered like the heavens before a storm, and as his mother’s eyes darkened with grief he burst into tears and fell into her arms, crying upon her shoulder until he was utterly spent. She held him as if he were a child again, weeping over a broken doll or a finger pinched in the doorway. The moment his sobs began to quiet, she put forth the question again, seemingly determined to hear the reply no matter how sorely it might wound him. 

“What happened to Haru-chan, my darling?” The pet name loosened his tongue as her fear had failed to do, and the words spilled forth like water down a bank grown feeble with summer rain.

“Dead,” he gasped, beginning to weep again. “Oh, Mother, Milad grew to be such a fine lad—strong and bright and beautiful as the day—but Haru never knew it. We were wearing hemlock-weeds, Rei and Milad and I, and Milad went to sit by his grave with Momo.”

“Are you certain this dream showed you a day to come?” she said urgently, for the last news had greatly unsettled her. 

“It was a match for yours, Mother,” he said, blinking the tears from his lashes as he drank once more from the goblet. 

“This is ill news indeed,” she muttered, clutching at the ends of her hair. “But I cannot fathom why he was laid to rest in Qasr—nor why he had a grave at all, for the folk of Iwatobi burn their dead and throw the ashes to the desert. It must be here that he met his death, and not at home.”

Makoto looked up again in horror, and after commanding him to finish his soup and rest for an hour longer, she set her jaw and rose to depart.

“What shall we do?” he asked, clutching the beloved hand as if he grasped at life itself. 

She said nothing more, bending swiftly to kiss his brow before vanishing into the outer ward and leaving her son alone in the quiet of his room.

* * *

“Where are you going?” yawned Rei, who was tucking into an early supper with Milad in his lap. It was but four hours after noon, but the steward had not slept at all that night, having remained awake after leaving the infirmary so Haru might be told the moment Makoto wished to see him. 

“Up to the fourth level for another round of letters,” sighed the prince, sitting cross-legged by the table to put on his slippers. “It will be the gladdest news I have penned in all my life, that is sure, but I do not think I will return before midnight.”

“You will have your bed to yourself tonight, I daresay,” answered the younger lad, feeding Milad a spoonful of rabbit stew. “I’ll come to fetch you if Milad refuses his bath.”

“Do away with the bath and put him to bed the moment he begins to nod,” ordered Haru. “You have not the strength to manage him tonight.”

Rei sent him a weary look of acquiescence over a bowl of broth and returned his attention to his meal. Having donned his shoes, Haru called a farewell to his friend and bounded out into the corridor—only to find himself tumbling into what seemed to be a heap of parcels, which descended over his head like a thunderstorm as he flailed about amidst a sea of boxes and wrapping-paper. After struggling for a moment or two, he poked his nose out of the unwieldy pile of goods and looked up and down the passageway, seeing nothing but knobbly packages and a dull-looking soldier curled up like a cat by the children’s apartments. Haru freed himself from the parcels and made his way to the guard, treading softly so as not to startle the fellow. 

“What upon earth are these for?” he asked, indicating the small mountain before his door. “And who brought them here?”

“Gifts for your manservant, my Lord,” said the soldier, scrambling to his feet and bowing low to the prince. “All the palace has heard of how he delivered His Highness from death, and the townsfolk have been bringing parcels for him to the palace gates since noon.”

Having done his duty, the man bowed once more and made off toward the stairs, leaving Haru standing alone in the corridor. Briefly hoping that Rin had not yet woken, or that he had forgotten Haru’s promise to finish the letters that day, he cleared a path to the door and wriggled through it, emerging into his parlor again. 

“Rei,” he panted, freeing his belt from the latch. “Put Milad in his cot and come out into the passage.”

The steward frowned and hastened to obey, hurrying into the bedroom and returning without the baby. “What is the matter?”

“Tokens of thanks for you, I think,” said Haru, once Rei stood gaping beside him at the packages lying scattered across in the hall. “Or so said the man who was standing watch.”

The two lads fell to work at once, gathering up the presents and carrying them one by one over the threshold before setting them in tidy rows against the east wall of the parlor. By and by the twins arrived with the news that Rin had frightened away all the maidservants on the floor above with his bellowing, and Haru dispatched little Ren to fetch Seijurou to aid the advisor instead. 

“Sei is the only one who can manage him so,” said Ran, nodding sagely at the prince as he tottered past the divan with an armful of riding-boots. 

“It is a wonder that anyone can, save Sakura,” groaned Rei, who lay flat upon the hearthrug under a roll of heavy silk. “Whatever do they mean by sending all of this? I am only a manservant—what need have I for thirty yards of yellow satin? Surely the tailor cannot afford to lose it, no matter how grateful he may be.”

“There is coin, too,” observed Hayato, who had undone the stitching on the neck of a gunny-sack and spilled what seemed to be a bucketful of golden  _ mallas  _ across the carpet. “And enough to trade for a pony, if you wanted one.”

“Nay, I do not,” said the steward, putting the bolt of silk into the cupboard and turning towards an enormous parcel of sugar and flour from the confectioners in the marketplace. “This I will send directly to the kitchens, for I do not know how to make so much as a tart.”

Haru nodded from where he sat by the writing-desk, examining the contents of a burlap satchel. 

“See what the physicians sent you,” he called, lifting out a jar of tallow sweetened with lemon-balm. “Half their stores of medicine and a letter.” He took the roll of parchment from the bag and flung it at his friend, who stretched out a weary hand and plucked it from the air. Rei busied himself with reading the missive as Haru unwrapped a stack of cotton tunics and rose to carry them into the inner chamber. He had finished hanging the last of the nightshirts beside Rei’s linen trousers when a cry rang out from the parlor; after shutting the door of the cupboard, he caught his foot under the carpet and stumbled out into the sitting room to find the manservant weeping on a divan with the letter clutched to his heart. Ran and Hayato were tugging at his sleeves on either side, clamoring to see the message themselves as they peeped over his shoulder.

“What in God’s name is the matter?” cried Haru, crossing the parlor with a bound in his hurry to reach the sofa. 

Rei seemed to have found himself incapable of speech, for he passed the scroll to Haru without so much as a word and suffered the children’s caresses in silence. The prince lowered his eyes to the sheet and began to read, his eyes growing wide as they traveled down the page. 

_ Honoured Master,  _

_ Following your timely deed that spared the Crown Prince’s life, we the palace physicians are united in agreement that you would be a valued addition to our numbers, if you chose to take up an apprenticeship with one of the senior members of the guild. Many of our masters would be glad to have you, and should you come to us you would have the pick of them. It is our understanding that you are to make your home in Qasr after marrying the head of the dancing- troupe, and should you wish to delay your studies until after your wedding our doors will remain open to you.  _

_ We shall honor your reply, no matter what it proves to be, but recall before you answer that the wisdom and attention to care that the surgeons observed in you last night would save many a parting soul if given the chance.  _

“You must join them!” cried Haru, dropping the letter onto the writing-desk and shaking his friend by the arm. “You wished to be a healer when we were children, and I have not forgotten it—you must go!”

“Yes, you must!” shrieked Hayato, jumping into Rei’s lap and bouncing on his knee. “You saved Makoto’s life—think of all the rest that need you, Rei-chan!”

“It is true that I wished to be a healer,” said the steward, gently pushing the lad back onto the divan and rising to pace about the room. “But I have no skill in it, Haru. It is from Aki’s weaponry lessons that I recalled the piece about the blade, not from any knowledge of medicine.”

“But none of the physicians could have done a thing,” Ran rejoined, jumping off the sofa and running to his side. “You can learn their craft easily enough, can’t you?”

“There is Nagisa to think of, too,” Haru reminded him. “You will be better paid as a healer, for you will not refuse their efforts to reward you for your labors, as you did to me.”

“I did a manservant’s work and so I took home a manservant’s wage to my mother,” said Rei flatly. “Although there is the matter of payment—I have not the coin to spare for an apprenticeship, so I shall have to decline.”

“Perhaps you didn’t this morning,” sang Ren, who had entered through the connecting door to Makoto’s rooms. “But you are wealthy enough for it now.” He pointed to the pile of gold still lying upon the carpet, and at the excited grins that passed between Haru and the children, Rei threw up his hands and sighed. 

“Very well. I will do it.”

There was much rejoicing in the chamber after that, and one by one the rest of the Qasrians braved the growing heap of parcels in the corridor to sidle into the parlor and inquire where the prince and the steward had been all day. They departed with armfuls of gifts, for robbed of sleep and supper as he was, Rei could not bear to look at the presents lying scattered about the sitting room. 

Momo and Nagisa, when they arrived, claimed a box of almond sweetmeats and a chest of fragrant sandalwood, which Nagisa promptly filled with a bundle of costly slippers for the dancing-troupe. When Gou came to see where her brother-in-law had gone, she found herself greeted by a bolt of cream-colored lace, which Haru suggested she take as a new overgown for her best robe. Sakura waltzed into the chamber shortly after the eighth bell of the evening upon her husband’s arm, and loosed a shriek that awoke Milad in his cot when Hayato gave her an emerald sash that set off her fiery locks to perfection. Seijurou tramped in behind them, still clad in his mail and helm. 

“Is there anything for me, then?” asked Rin, as his wife wrapped herself in a velvet robe and danced across to the looking-glass to observe the effect.

“Take your pick,” groaned Rei, who was curled up on the divan between a jar of powdered saffron and a pelt of rabbit’s fur. “I cannot carry all of this back to Iwatobi when we go, and there isn’t nearly enough room for it here.”

“Hands off!” cried Sakura, flinging the gown and sash away and snatching a pair of jeweled sabers from her brother’s arms. “Keep your greedy fingers to yourself, Sei—what need have you for both?”

“I have two hands, do I not?” said the General. “But I suppose I will manage well enough with one, if you would like the other.” 

She passed the heavier blade to him and searched through the parcels until she found a shirt of silver mail, which she slipped on over her practice-tunic. 

“Will it suit me for the tournament, do you think?” she asked, looking earnestly at her reflection. “We will be having it, won’t we?”

“I’d forgotten,” muttered Seijurou. “It will be during the autumn festival, of course, and we were ready to do away with it in order to honor Makoto.”

“Why?” inquired Haru. 

“It is always so, when one of the royal family passes on,” said Rin heavily, striking a somewhat ridiculous figure in a feathered cap and coat. “The celebrations would not have resumed again until the following year, if we had lost him.”

“Will you be joining it?”

“I? Not on your life,” snorted the advisor. “I have never so much as lifted a weapon, for my tutor kept me at my books from dawn to dusk until I was eighteen.”

“You worked yourself nearly to the bone after Father died,” Gou chided. “Do not blame the old man, for he had nothing to do with it—and you are frightened of swords, so don’t pretend otherwise.”

“I shall be joining it, of course, as will the better half of my men,” said Sei, lifting his voice over Rin’s infuriated protests. 

“And I,” crowed Sakura, who was gloating over a fine collection of throwing-knives set with lapis lazuli and mother-of-pearl. “Do you want to keep these, Rei?”

“Take them if you like,” sighed Haru. “He fell asleep long ago, and he will be as cross as a bear when he awakens if we cannot clear away the things by morning.”

“There is little hope of that,” said Gou wryly, putting her head out into the hall. “Fifteen more must have arrived since we came, at least— _ oh! _ ” She slipped through the door without another word, leaving the others to relinquish their spoils and follow her out into the corridor.

There in the passageway was a row of wooden tubs, each of them filled to the brim with bundles of summer flowers kept fresh in growing-houses long after their season had passed. From where he stood upon the threshold between Sakura and Gou, Haru caught sight of carnations the color of blood, saffron-crocuses with scarlet pistils curling from their throats, great yellow flowers he had never set eyes upon before, nearly as wide across as Hayato’s head—buttercups and feverfew, cockscomb and wolfsbane, and a hundred others whose names he did not recall, having grown to manhood knowing nothing but the indigo and strawberry darts of the desert.

It was the work of no more than quarter-hour to fill all the vases in the place, and once every shelf and alcove in the apartment was dressed in a riot of color, Haru took a nosegay of the finest marigolds and set them in a bowl of water before putting on an overgown and hunting beneath the clutter for his slippers.

“Where are you going?” called Nagisa, draping a patterned shawl over Rei’s shoulders.

“Down to the infirmary,” said the prince, stooping to embrace the children before turning back to the door. They did not protest at his going, for unlike their elders they had not grown weary of opening packages and adorning themselves with gloves and gowns before the looking-glass. 

It was but two hours before midnight when he arrived at the healing halls, and the physician who met him at the doors was loath to let him through to Makoto’s room. After extracting the Iwatobian’s promise not to remain too long, the man bowed him past and retreated into another ward, muttering under his breath about thoughtless youths and foolhardy princes. Haru swept back the linen curtain and let himself into the sickroom, finding to his joy that Makoto had surrendered long ago to the arms of a tranquil slumber. An anxious frown lingered about his mouth, as if the cares of the day had taken it upon themselves to follow the lad into his dreams. 

Haru put the flowers upon the nightstand and bent to brush the lines from Makoto’s brow, finding to his astonishment that they grew smooth again at his touch. He observed his friend for a moment longer before striking a match and lighting the candle that stood by the bed, watching the golden light dancing over the shadows below the prince’s eyes. The burning candle made his weariness plain as not even the worst of the fevers had done, and though the danger was past Haru felt as if he had been stricken to the heart to see Makoto thus, confined to a narrow pallet in the infirmary when he ought to have been free to spend his days among the ones he loved. Haru took the shrunken hands in his, tracing the newly-risen mounds of bone as the Qasrian turned in his sleep. 

He sat there for perhaps an hour longer, and when at last one of the medics drew the curtain he made his apologies and rose to his feet, stooping to kiss Makoto upon his cheek before turning to depart. The prince had taken no more than a step before Makoto caught at his hand, and as his eyes flickered open Haru knew that his friend still lay sleeping. 

“Do not go,” sighed the Qasrian, his fingers tightening upon the younger lad’s. “I have dreamt enough of late—I cannot see you leave me, Haru. It was dull and dark as the depths of the earth without you, and I would have given the world to have you beside me again.”

“I would remain with you for ever if you wished it,” whispered Haru. “Until you grow weary of me, my heart, I shall not leave your side.” 

There was no reply, but still Makoto did not let go of his arm—and after hearing the unconscious plea, spoken in the midst of a heavy slumber, nothing could have coaxed Haruka to draw away from him. 

He crept back to his chair and laid his head upon the nightstand, blinking wearily at the light flickering over the marigolds in their silver bowl. When the healer returned again, she found him fast asleep beside her liege, upon whose lips there hovered the palest ghost of a smile. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I won't be updating again for a while; you can expect the next chapter around Christmas! In the meanwhile, I do intend to upload a oneshot set in the Sped By Flame AU and am accepting possible prompts for it (the details are [here](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/) at my tumblr) from now until December 10th. Send an ask if you have any questions!


	10. Of Sugar and Scimitars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Haru takes up his sword again and the twins have duties of their own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MORE ILLUSTRATIONS! I'm so excited to be uploading them with the chapter for the first time! However, alsas did one for chapter 4 as well. Here are the tumblr links for all three:
> 
> [Makoto, Haru, and Milad in Chapter 4](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/168421351776/ten-minutes-later-milad-had-drawn-the-ends-of) 
> 
> [Haru and Hiro](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/168879077701/the-little-prince-could-never-bear-to-blindfold) 
> 
> [Makoto, Hayato, and the twins](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/168879148496/hayato-sent-her-a-determined-nod-and-redoubled-his)

The days after Makoto awoke went swiftly, for after the healers had assured themselves that he would recover, the palace turned its thought wholly towards the coming festival. A great pavilion was erected in the marketplace to house the figure of the autumn goddess, and the growing houses were drained nearly dry of their goods as the folk of the citadel sent for box after box of red and golden flowers. As Makoto’s advisor, Rin found himself twice as put-upon as he had been in previous years, for he would not permit his friend to lift so much as a leaf of parchment.

“ _Makoto Tachibana_ ,” he hissed, taking the prince by the collar and hauling him back to his bed. “Did I not tell you I would see to the preparations? If you leave your chamber _once_ more, I’ll go to your mother and have Haru sent back to Iwatobi.”

Makoto laughed. “She would be as loath to part from him as I am, and I have already lain abed too long.”

“Stuff and nonsense,” snorted the advisor, licking the point of his quill. “Go away, Makoto. If I cannot think of a fitting punishment, Sakura surely will, and hers shall be worse than anything I could dream of.”

Thus quelled, Makoto went back to his bedroom. He spent the better part of his days alone, for now that Ran and Ren were close upon their thirteenth birthdays their father thought them old enough to join in the work, and the little twins were so weary by the evening that they went straight to their beds after tramping through their brother’s apartment to kiss him goodnight.

Even Haru found little time to pass with the elder prince, for the moment Makoto was well enough to leave the infirmary, he had named Haru as his champion for the tournament. The Iwatobian declined at once, but Seijurou had happened upon the scene and promised that if Haru refused to join, he would persuade Azar to cease preparing her mackerel and oyster soup, of which Haru was passionately fond.

“You _can’t_ ,” Haru had gasped, nearly falling to his knees. “Anything but that, Sei!”

“I shall not be moved,” said the General, swinging the dizzy prince by the arm. “Makoto has jousted opposite me since we were little lads just learning to heft a blade, and you must take his place now that he cannot do it.”

“Please, Haru-chan,” Makoto begged, putting out a hand to draw his friend to his side. “You held fourth standing in the ranks at home, did you not?”

“Aye, I did,” grumbled Haru, fixing the unrepentant Rei with a sullen glare. “What cause had you to go bandying my rank about, Rei?”

“I was asked,” said the steward calmly. “Now, if you do not wish to be bested by half a dozen novices, you ought to put on your armor and go down to the practice ring.”

Thus defeated, Haru garbed himself in the fluid mail and followed the General down to the first level, where he learned the touch of sword and lance and bow again. He spent the first afternoon sparring with Seijurou and a handful of guards, and was pleasantly surprised to find that of his opponents only Sei had managed to best him.

It was like dancing, he thought, a dance he had trodden time and again since he was a child of five, breathless with awe at the sight of his first weapon—a clumsy thing of wood and leather, far too blunt to give him worse than a bruise. He recalled the mornings he had spent among the dunes with Aki in Iwatobi, turning the breeze to silver as his beloved _kaskara_ flashed like flame through the air. The hiss of the sabre, having narrowly missed his ear, was sweeter to him than he remembered; the sand of the arena gave like water at his touch, gathering about his feet as he darted across the floor.

 _Every one of them is a work of art, cousin._ He heard Aki’s voice as if it had risen from the halls of his boyhood, borne across the plains of the desert to stand beside him again. _Swords are like women; you must love them even as you shatter on hilt and scabbard, or they shall never surrender their secrets. They take shape under the hands of masters, and so they are your betters in the fight. Do right by your blade, Haru, and it shall never fail you._

 _We all bleed, who fight with the sword_ , came the murmur, as he sat one evening dressing a shallow wound to his arm that he had gained while fencing with Sakura. _For as closely as she knows your heart, so also may she break it._

The past was nearer to him as he wove back and forth with a scimitar than it had been for months—betimes he found that it was not Seijurou who stood before him, but a lad taller than even the general, having refused as ever to put on a helm while sparring, with laughter sparking upon every line of his face—in whose cobalt eyes there burned the fire of one devoted body and soul to his craft. But his cousin’s absence did not pain him as it had done during his first weeks away from home, for it was almost as if the beloved smile hung by his side, crying out for joy as it had always been wont to do.

_This is what you were born to, my brother._

And it was.

For as Sei and Sakura led him out to the archery pit and flung him a set of braces, he found that the weight of the crossbow felt like a song of home, the kiss of the feather brushing his cheek like half-forgotten lullabies on a cloudy evening. How had he flung it away, he wondered— surrendered something so dear without so much as a thought?

It was as if the two had been wedded at last—what he was, what he had been of old—that after a third of a year Haru was whole once more, that all he had lost was returned to him. And when he found himself upon a horse again, hefting a polished lance and lowering the grate over his eyes, he gazed up at the prince sitting alone in the stands and knew that but for Makoto’s heart he would have stood mired in darkness to the end of his days.

*          *          *

_My beloved brothers,_

_I need hardly say that as you wrote to me over the past fortnight of Makoto’s illness, matters were terribly thick at home, for while my heart ached for you both I was made aware that I might rule alone—that if the prince of Atar Qasr should die, Haru would be crown prince in his place after his wedding to Ran. Thus the news of his recovery is doubly sweet to me, and all of us here in Iwatobi wept for joy and pride when we heard how Rei had saved him—and because he endured me prattling on about my weaponry, no less! You are a marvel in the flesh, Rei, and though I can hardly think that within the year we will lose you to marriage, you will make a wonderful physician, for you are kind and wise and careful, and that will carry you far indeed when a man’s life is at stake. Give my regards to your betrothed, and tell me when you mean to depart for home so I may send a gift for your wedding._

_Haru, I commend you greatly for taking your place within the royal family, for you must not forget that in Qasr you stand for Iwatobi and all that we are. It is fitting indeed that you aided them at such an unhappy time. I pray it endeared you to your intended, and that you have not forgotten the letter I wrote to you in the days before your betrothal—or that you spoke of the matter with Makoto, at least. Jun says I am a worrywart of the first order, but I cannot help but think there may be trouble over it yet, or that you will act in haste and rue your errors later. I am sorry for this gloomy message, but I am the elder between us and so I must warn you of my fears, no matter how foolish they prove to be._

_To answer the missive I received before Makoto was taken ill, I shall not be able to attend the tournament, nor Rei’s marriage, for here we are terribly busy preparing for my wedding in Kanun al-Adar. Jun is the only one of us who is as fresh as a daisy still, for Mother has let her do nothing but choose her gown and gifts. I will look as gaunt as a ghost beside her, I am sure. You must of course return in time for the marriage, but it is still two months and a half away, so Rei must prepare for his own wedding before then. Master Ryuugazaki does not think it seemly to part a newly-joined pair so soon, and he has asked that you bring Nagisa back with you if he can possibly be spared for a while. You must, whether he can be spared or not, for a man is only married once and it would be a suitable wedding tour for him to journey to your childhood home. (It is odd indeed to call it so, but of course your place is in Qasr with your betrothed)._

            _All my love and a hundred kisses to you and to Milad,_

_Aki._

*          *          *

“Out with it at once.”

“No.”

“Haru, I cannot think that you kept it from me for so long—since before the betrothal, even—”

“I have been keeping it from all and sundry since the week we arrived here,” said Haru flatly, setting his foot upon the rim of the tub and scouring his knees with a scrubbing-brush. “Aki is the only one who knows of the matter, and if he had not written to us together it should have remained so.”

“Haru!” cried Rei, upending a bottle of almond oil over the steaming water. “I have always advised you—have you no faith in me?”

“There is nobody who has stood by me as truly as you have,” replied the prince, softening his voice as a wounded look stole over the steward’s face. “But this matter does not concern me, and to betray it now would be folly when I need no counsel.”

“From which I am left to gather that you have acted in haste, as Aki feared,” sighed the younger lad. “Oh, Haru—it has everything to do with you, if it has to do with Ran, for she is to be your wife and princess of Iwatobi some day.”

Haru flicked a dismissive hand and began to lather his arms. “It is nothing, Rei.”

Rei frowned from where he sat by the brazier, poking gloomily at the boiling water. “It is only a small comfort, but at least you bathe yourself as you ought, now that you are training with the guards,” he sighed.

“I spend a quarter of an hour in the bath each morning,” said Haru, aghast.

“Aye, with your tunic and breeches on—and without so much as a particle of soap.”

They glared at one another for a moment, and then burst into laughter as they thought of how they had often quarreled together at home—Haru in the tub and Rei sitting by the kettle, advancing angrily toward the suds to draw his master up for breath and scolding until he was hoarse.

“Oh, very well,” said the prince. “They aren’t here, are they?”

“No, they are grinding balm in the kitchens with the maidservants,” answered Rei. The same duty had fallen to the manservant’s lot in Iwatobi before the yearly festivals, and he was glad indeed to be done with it.

“Do you recollect that Ran and I were to dine together, three mornings after the welcoming feast?”

“I believe I do, though I was not chosen as chaperone,” said Rei, frowning as he thought of the day in question. “That was the afternoon Nagisa told me the tale of Dahab-E-Noor in the halls of lore.”

“She and I never did have luncheon,” said Haru, sinking down until only his head remained above the surface. “I was waiting for her in the garden, and she did not come to greet me. I thought she had forgotten, until I put my head through the hedge and found her weeping in a flowerbed with Hayato. The two of them had planned to marry when they were grown, and they were sorely hurt at the thought that she was to be wed to me.”

Rei’s mouth fell open. “Hayato—and _Ran?_ ” he hissed. He went to the door and bolted it, before sliding down to rest upon the tile. “Then that is why she was so queer and stiff at first—she thought you were taking him from her?”

“And wholly,” answered the prince, shivering at the memory. “You recall the letter the sultan wrote to my uncle—in which he said that Ran might go to live with us in Iwatobi the moment Makoto had an heir of his own?”

“Poor child,” murmured the steward, looking at his betrothal ring and thanking the heavens that he had been free to wed the one he loved. “She must have hated the sight of you, surely.”

“She did, for a time,” frowned Haru. “It was as if she changed in a night, now that I think of it. As if one morning it tried her to stand in my presence, and the next I was dear as brother to her.”

“And Aki told you to speak of the matter to Makoto when you wrote?” asked Rei. “Have you done as he said?”

“I spoke to no one of what I heard that day,” sighed the elder lad. “They would likely have been promised to one another if not for me, and I could not bring either of them into trouble.”

“And rightly so. But what will you do when she comes of age?”

Haru thought of the betrothal contract he had sealed for the children. Rei would surely be beside himself to hear of what he had done, and so he shook his head at the steward and clambered out of the tub.

“I shall marry her, as I am meant to do,” he said, winding a drying cloth about his waist.

The words did not falter on his lips, for he knew Ran would never be his wife as surely as he knew his own name. He was no wiser as to how to break the news that she and Hayato were betrothed, but as he passed swiftly into the bedroom he remembered Makoto, Makoto who loved the little twins above all the others blessed to know his gentle heart—and felt himself possessed of an ally who would champion his treachery to the very ends of the earth.

Rei departed while Haru was dressing, calling over his shoulder about a tryst with Nagisa as he went. The prince nodded to his friend and watched the heavy door fall shut behind him; once the steward had gone, Haru took Milad in his arms and let himself into the adjoining room.

He rarely had cause to be in Makoto’s apartment; after all, the Qasrian spent the better part of his nights with Haru and Milad, and the better part of his days between the council chambers and the practice ring. Makoto had shown the rooms to him shortly after his arrival four months previously, and after the betrothal night was finished Haru had not set foot in them again.

“Papa!” cried Milad, wriggling until Haru set him down upon Makoto’s bed. “Hurt?” he asked, his rose-leaf mouth twisting into a fearful pout as Makoto drew in his breath at the quake of the mattress beneath him.

“No, not at all,” said Makoto, laughing as he bent to kiss the baby upon the brow. “That was his name for _you_ , was it not?” he added in aside to his friend, who snorted.

“If I begged him to call me _aita_ once I have done it a hundred times,” chuckled the Iwatobian, drawing a chair beside the bed. “He persists in calling me Mama, and I can do naught but pray he will know the difference in a year or so.”

The alteration was sudden—so sudden that Haru knew he had not imagined it any more than he could have imagined a camel tearing across the room and nibbling at the tapestries. Makoto’s face fell as if he had been dealt a heavy blow, and his cheeks went pale as they had been during the terrible fortnight during which he had lain in his deathly sleep. The moment had thrown a pall over the golden afternoon, and after Haru and Milad returned to the opposite chamber following an early supper, Makoto buried his face in the bolster and wept.

The dream had weighed on his thoughts night and day, ever since he had woken from slumber and revealed the worst of the nightmare to his mother. The thought of Haru’s body shut away in a vault of stone, as the custom was in Qasr—or wrapped in a linen shroud and cast into a bloodthirsty fire—was too terrible to bear, and as he sat in the darkness with his knuckles pressed to his eyes he knew at last why the vision had been sent to him. There was no need, he realized, for him to be tormented so unless it was in his power to deliver his friend from death. His own brush with the world beyond was proof of it—all that had decided his fate was how closely Rei had listened to his cousin’s ramblings nearly eleven years ago. Haru had told him some weeks ago of how he himself had dozed off that morning and risen to find Aki still chattering away, and decided to end his suffering by hurling a lump of chalk at his cousin’s head.

As he lay below the satin canopy, he recalled how dear the nights had been, spent beside Haru and Milad. He had been obliged to sleep alone after leaving the infirmary, so as not to trouble the wound—but that evening he found that he could not pass another hour in the empty room, and throwing back the coverlet he got to his feet and hurried through his parlor until he let himself into Haru’s.

Rei and Nagisa were there, speaking together in what seemed to be the Iwatobian tongue, of all things—about their marriage, Makoto gathered, and bowing to them he went into Haru’s bedchamber without a word. He felt their puzzled glances linger on his neck, but after turning away from the couple he shut the door behind him and felt as if his heart would burst from the beauty of the scene that met his eyes.

 Haru sat cross-legged upon the bed with Milad in his lap, murmuring a tale that Makoto himself had loved in his childhood. It was not only the story that had touched him so, for the words that left the prince’s lips were sung in the Qasrian speech—rougher by far than he had ever heard them uttered before, and yet such tenderness lived in the mellow tones that he felt tears begin to gather on his lashes.

The Iwatobian glanced up at the soft sound of the latch falling into place, and as he saw the figure before him he put out a hand, as if he had known how dearly Makoto had missed them both.

“How long you have been,” he whispered, setting aside the little volume of poetry and lifting Milad up so his downy head lay on the father’s shoulder. “I dared not ask you to return, for I know there has not been time enough—”

“Nay,” said Makoto, feeling at once like a stranger in the room that had been as good as his for the better part of three months. “I could not bear to remain away from you and Milad another night.”

A quick look at his friend proved that the younger lad had borne their parting with no more grace than Makoto himself had done, and choking back a sob the Qasrian made his way to the mattress and settled himself upon the left side of the bed—which had been left empty for him. Haru tucked Milad in between them and blew out the candle burning upon the nightstand before lying back beside the child and shutting his eyes.  

“Haru-chan?”

There was no reply—none but the whisper of a scarred palm trailing over silken sheets, and the half-forgotten embrace as Haru took Makoto’s hand in his.

“When will you return to Iwatobi?”

“Nine weeks from now,” he murmured, “for Aki’s wedding is in the winter, and of course we must be present for it.”

“I do not know what I shall do, when you are gone,” Makoto confessed. “You and Milad are dearer than life to me, and it will be bitter as gall without you both.”

“We must be drawn apart sometime,” said Haru, “But perhaps not as soon as that, I think. Aki’s wedding will be a spectacle of the ages, and I doubt your father would refuse if I asked you to accompany us home.”

Makoto wondered how it was that in the summer he had planned with Sei and Rin for Haru’s arrival—expecting to find a friend and brother, if Ran’s intended proved to be a pleasant man—and that now they lay side-by-side in the chill of autumn, more than a month after Haru ought to have journeyed home again, wishing with all their might that they might spend all their days with one another.

“Aye,” he whispered. “I will go with you, Haru-chan.”

*          *          *

_He knew not where he was, at first—until a glint of yellow shone upon the tile, and as the sun lifted her head over the dunes to the east Haru found himself standing in his old bedchamber, the one he had shared with Aki and Rei in his youth. It was just as he recalled, and yet not the same, for there were sketches pinned up about the walls, drawings of desert blooms and slumbering camels. As he drew near to look at them, he thought he knew the hand that made them—and yet he did not, for they were clumsier by far than his own and Rei’s._

_Haru glanced at the beds that lay to his left and right—Aki’s and his, the latter of which had also been Rei’s until they had grown too tall to lie in it together. A smile flickered at the corners of his mouth, for the shapes beneath the covers slept just as they had done—the first sprawled over the mattress with one foot hanging to the floor, and the second as still and straight as if it had been laid out for burial. A head of raven hair peeped from under the larger quilt, and a mass of mahogany curls spilled from below the smaller one._

_“They remind you of us, do they not?”_

_He turned and saw that Aki stood beside him, greatly altered from the brother he had known. The mischief in his eyes had been replaced by a gentle look, the glittering gems of his sash and train with delicate stitching in red and gold._

_“They do,” he whispered, watching in wonder as his cousin’s children stirred in their sleep. The elder of the two was in her seventh year, perhaps, and when she rolled to her feet and tripped with a yawn into her father’s arms, her uncle caught sight of her eyes—as wide and blue as the sighing sea, the treasured eyes of the Nanase clan._

_Against his will he was turned away from them, and though he tried with all his strength to return to Aki he found himself creeping into the little room where Rei had slept once they could no longer fit side-by-side in Haru’s bed. There was a child slumbering there, as well—a child with hair bound up in the Qasrian fashion, and as he sighed in the midst of a pleasant dream Haru felt as if his heart would break, for it was far too poor a vessel to hold such love._

_It was Milad, and Haru should have known him anywhere—for that stubborn chin could not belong to another, nor the feathery brows and the rose-leaf mouth, nor the silken wisps of ebony hair, fluttering by his cheek in ebb and flow of his breath. He had grown tall, taller than even Aki had been as a lad of ten, and as Haru looked upon his child he felt the wind stutter in his throat._

_“You did well in bringing him up, the both of you,” said Aki, who had come in behind him with his younger daughter snoring on his shoulder. “He is a fine lad, you know.”_

_“There never was a finer one, “ laughed Haru. “Better than we were, surely.”_

_“I still wonder how it all came about,” mused his cousin. “That you departed these halls as a lad of nineteen—and went on to live a tale that shall be remembered for all time.”_

_“I am but a humble prince, Aki—hardly the stuff of legend,” he replied, gazing fondly at the pair of rings on the third finger of his left hand. “I cannot help that I found myself husband and father before I was twenty, for our circumstances were hardly ordinary.”_

_“Humble my foot,” snorted the older man. “You were the one who taught me to bathe my Hana when she was born, and you were as smug as the cat who caught the canary all the while.”_

_“I did not teach you a thing,” argued Haru. “Rei took Hana and washed her clean, and I sat in the bathtub and laughed.”_

_“It is a pity he did not accompany you,” sighed Aki. “But of course his duties are greater by far than ours, now that his apprenticeship is over and done with.”_

_“Aye, and Nagisa did not think it wise to take Ami across the desert so soon after her fever.”_

_“They call her by two names, do they not?”_

_Haru chuckled._

_“Ami was what she called herself, when she came to them—but her hair is as golden as Nagisa’s, and so before she had been with them a week Rei began to call her Dahab-E-Noor.”_

_“Of course it_ would _be Rei who named his daughter so,” Aki snorted. “But it is beautiful, and that I cannot deny.”_

_“It was a surprise when she chose to take on a healing apprenticeship,” reflected Haru. “After all, she is so much like Nagisa that we believed she would join the dancers.”_

_“Uncle,” grumbled the little girl in Aki’s arms, wriggling as she tucked her head into her father’s neck. “Hush. It is too early,”_

_With that the men laughed and fell silent, and leaving Haru alone in Milad’s room Aki tiptoed into the outer chamber to put his daughter back to bed._

*          *          *

When Rei opened his eyes upon the silent room, he lay quietly for a moment wondering what had woken him. The window was still dark beyond the violet curtains; sunrise was many hours off, and Nagisa slumbered peacefully beside him, gripping at the laces of his tunic as he dreamed. The steward sighed and turned his cheek back into the pillow, entwining his hand with Nagisa’s again as he tried to return to sleep.

Not half a minute later there came the sound of someone moving about the parlor, and as the footsteps went swiftly across to Haru’s bedroom, Rei shot upright and put on his slippers—for he knew Haru’s gait and Makoto’s as well as he knew his own, and the person padding across the carpet was neither of the princes. He flung a dark cloak about his shoulders and crept out into the narrow corridor, watching with bated breath as a tall, slender figure wrapped in a heavy mantle laid a hand upon his master’s door. It opened at the touch, and before the manservant could cry a word in warning the spectre passed swiftly in, leaving the door ajar behind it. It did not strike a match to look about the room, and Rei cursed himself for having forgotten his spectacles on the nightstand.

In the pale moonlight spilling from the flowered balcony, he saw the figure stoop by the bed, close by the side where Makoto slept. The steward’s heart leapt into his throat, and as silently as he could he made his way to the divan and ducked behind it. He searched the darkness for the glint of a dagger, but the next instant he saw that the intruder had lifted a corner of the mattress to rummage about beneath it. Rei frowned, for he knew what Haru kept between the featherticks—the letters Aki had written to him, stacked neatly below the blankets so they might always be close at hand. He did not dare to make a sound, and as softly as it had entered the apparition tucked a sheaf of parchment into its robes and retreated, shutting the door to Haru’s room and streaking across the parlor like a shadow.

A cloud swept across the window, and before darkness descended wholly upon the chamber he saw a long-fingered hand _unlatch_ the outer door. He nearly cried out at the sight, for he had locked the door himself before retiring for the evening, and if neither Haru nor Makoto had awoken to open it after he fell into slumber—

He could not fathom how their silent visitor had come, for once locked the door did not open from the passageway—and as he trembled behind an armchair the figure paused briefly upon the threshold before melting into the night like the echo of an unearthly dream.

As the muffled footsteps died away down the corridor, Rei scrambled to his feet and ran to the door, securing the lock and dropping the great iron bolt across the lath so that they might be safe until morning. He returned to his room upon trembling legs, and as he lay beside Nagisa he did not dare to sleep again until the ruddy rays of dawn had begun to spill from behind the drapes.

He was shaken awake at the seventh bell, and when he raised his heavy eyelids he saw his intended peering down at him, resting a gentle hand upon his cheek as he frowned at the circles about the steward’s eyes.

“Are you ill, _amarya?_ ” asked Nagisa. “Mako-chan will have breakfast sent up if you are too weary to go down to the kitchens.”

Rei shook his head.

“Nagisa, is there any way to enter the chamber without passing the door to the corridor?”

“Of course,” said the dancer, puzzled. “There is the connecting door to Makoto’s apartments.”

“Nay, not that either,” said Rei, who knew that while Makoto and the children passed freely between the three sets of rooms at all hours of the day, neither the crown prince’s chambers nor the twins’ could be entered from the passageway after dark had fallen. “Someone came to the parlor last night and crept into Haru’s bedroom—and they did not use the parlor door or the one to the hall.”

Nagisa’s eyes went wide. “Who?”

“I did not see, for like a fool I left my spectacles behind,” he muttered. “But he searched beneath the mattress, where Haru keeps Aki’s letters, and took one of the envelopes before going away again.”

“Do you remember them all?” asked the younger lad. “Perhaps if you counted the letters you would know which of them was stolen.”

“Aye, I would know,” said Rei, springing up and bounding down the corridor to the opposite chamber. It was empty, for Haru had gone down to the practice ring and Makoto was toiling away in the kitchens with Gou and the twins. The steward knelt beside the bedstead and turned up the mattress, taking the tidy stack of letters from the boards below. He spread them on the coverlet, marking the epistles by their dates—the first through the fifth week of Subat, the first through the fourth of Huzayran—

“They are all here,” he said, perplexedly folding the letter that Aki had written to the pair of them and tucking it back into place. “Not one of them is missing, and yet the thief surely took one last night.”

“Perhaps it wasn’t a letter,” suggested Nagisa.

“Nay, it had to have been,” sighed the steward. “I watched him take it, and Haru has always kept his letters beneath the foot of the bed—even in Iwatobi. There is one for every week, but perhaps he sent two letters with the same caravan when he heard that Makoto was wounded.”

After puzzling over the matter for a while longer, Nagisa was called away to the performance halls, for the dancing troupe had a new piece to learn for each of the ten days of the festival. Left alone in the empty chamber, Rei stifled a shudder and hurried down to the archery fields to watch the champions practicing for the tournament.  

Haru had been glad to take a three months’ leave from training, he thought; his friend had often bemoaned the hours he was forced to keep, rising day after day at sunrise with Aki while Rei himself slept on in the adjoining room. The result of it all was that Rei had scarcely seen his master so, drawing the arrow to his cheek as he narrowed his eyes at the target fifty yards before him. He stood like one of the kings of old, molded to the curving limbs of the bow as if the two were one, and when the crimson vane brushed his ear in passing it seemed to carry him forth into its flight.

But all the same it recalled him to his youth, for long ago he had known the sight of Haru standing thus—amidst the dunes with his mother, watching the falconers set the raptors loose to dart between the shadows in search of the great black snakes that passed for meat in Iwatobi. Haru had loved to look at them, sitting beside Rei for hour upon hour as Aki’s grey goshawk flew back and forth until it had collected enough of the scaly beasts for supper. The breath caught in his throat anew with every touch of the talons on Aki’s forearm, and when at last the younger lad was deemed old enough to care for a bird of his own, he had chosen an eagle with feathers that burned like burnished gold. Haru had called him Hiro, after his cousin, and nearly from the first the two were friends. The little prince could never bear to blindfold him, even during the months before the bird was trained—but it hardly mattered at all, for if permitted to do so the eagle would not leave his master’s side. But when they stood together against the sun, predator and prince, it seemed as if they were a single spirit, drawn once and once again into mortal flesh. Rei had hardly known where the shoulder ended and the feathers began, so closely were they bound, and when Hiro spread his wings upon the prince’s lifted hand it was almost as if Haru himself had risen in flight.

Once the steward had asked his friend what drew him to the kingly bird, and after stopping a moment to think Haru had answered thus.

“He knows no trammels, my Hiro,” he laughed, tipping back his face to look upon the eagle as it sped through the skies above them. “See how he flies, Rei! He might go to the ends of the earth if he wished, and as long as there is a goodly wind at his breast there are no laws for him—he is as free a creature as ever was. How I wish I were so—and lord of the air as he is, still he returns to me!”

Their joy had been short-lived in the end, for all they loved each other. Rei had found Hiro listless and dull on his perch some weeks after Haru’s fifteenth birthday, and despite the tender care of the falconers he only grew worse as the days went by. Haru had been half-mad with grief, and when at last his regal friend was laid to rest not even Aki’s loving arms could soothe him. The prince had not so much as set his hand to a falcon since then, and neither did he turn his eyes to the heavens as he had been wont to do—for it was too great a wound to see it empty, and worst of all was the sight of an ugly vulture where a kite of gold and bronze should have wheeled overhead.

It was as if that vanished grace had returned to him, Rei thought, the grace Haru had only known when he stood in the desert and imagined himself as free as his lordly companion, unchained by the weight of the dusty earth and lithe as a dancer on the sun. But Haru had been greatly altered from his days in the Iwatobian army—he adored the lines of wood and sinew as he had adored his Hiro’s fallen feathers, and at once the steward saw that the best of his master’s youth and manhood had drawn together as one.

At last, he was shaken from his musings by the solid thump of the arrow striking the target, a shapeless bundle of sacking painted blue and yellow and sewn about a bushel of straw. Rei glanced up to see the slender shaft protruding from the golden heart, and Haru’s limbs relaxed as if the barb had been shot from his own body.

“That was a beautiful shot,” called a serving lad, running across the field to retrieve it.

“It was,” Seijurou agreed, casting an appreciative eye at Haru’s grip upon the bow. “I suppose you wouldn’t care to join the guards for training after the tournament.”

“You suppose rightly,” said Haru, withdrawing so that Sakura could take her turn. She drew back her arm and loosed the arrow in a single movement, and before the three men had followed its path a shout went up from the watching soldiers, for the stipe of wood had buried itself to the fletching in the hapless bale of hay. Seijurou heaved a mournful sigh as she turned to another target, nocking her second arrow as she went.

“It is a pity she gave herself to dancing,” he groaned, shaking his head as the little bundle of straw found itself skewered through the heart. “She would have been finer than every last one of my men—and the women, too, if she put her mind to it.”

“What granted me my skill, do you think?” cried the laughing girl, releasing the bowstring a third time and bounding back to Haru’s side. “I did not gain my strength from fencing, that is sure.”

“How is that?” asked Rei. “Nagisa and the rest are slightly built, but you are stronger by far than they.”

“Nagisa and I are the most accomplished dancers of the troupe,” she said, and in her steady tones it was no boast—only the simple truth, one only a fool would dare to challenge. “His footwork is finer, and I am taller, so when we dance opposite one another he takes the part of the leading maiden, and I the part of the leading man. You have not seen it since you arrived, but half the time I dance upon pointed toes bearing Nagisa’s weight as well as my own.”

Rei and Haru glanced swiftly at the muscles of her arms, which stood out even beneath the stiff lines of her mail. They had surely been slender once, but through her years of dancing, jousting, and archery they had grown until they were nearly as broad as her brother’s.

“What are you doing down here, Rei?” asked Haru suddenly, turning to his friend. “I thought you were preparing a hymn for the first night of the festival.”

“It is done,” said the steward. “I finished the last five chords before supper last night, and Nagisa took it with him to the musicians’ chamber after we broke our fast this morning.”

“They are rehearsing with the musicians already?” asked Seijurou incredulously.

“Aye, all of us have charted our capers to the last turn,” said Sakura, slinging her fallen quiver over her shoulder. “I must go to join them now.”

And with that she scampered off, meeting an impatient Momo by the stands before disappearing back into the belly of the palace. Rei, having forgotten the events of the previous night, declined the general’s offer to teach him to shoot and followed the dancers into the corridor; it was not until later that afternoon that he remembered why he had gone down to the archery pit at all.

*          *          *

“Thirty-seven, now,” remarked Hayato, wielding the stamp with a deft and steady hand. He passed the squares of almond meal to Ran, who laid them flat in a dish of colored sugar before dropping them neatly into the great bowl that stood at her elbow.

“Hurry, Hayato,” urged Ren, tying shut a box of sweetmeats with a length of crimson ribbon and tucking it into the basket in his lap. “If the baskets aren’t filled by suppertime, the preparations for the feast shall be delayed.”

“He is right,” called Azar, who had stopped for a moment to cool her thirsty throat with a draught of fresh milk. “The three of you are old enough to help me as you ought, and I shall not have my kitchen maids harried for this before the ball.”

Hayato sent her a determined nod and redoubled his efforts, finishing the fragrant rolls faster than Ran could color them. Makoto laughed from his place by his brother’s right and poured a mortar of ground spices into the dish of a waiting cook, who bowed and made off toward the great kettles that stood simmering by the windows.

“It is pleasant, working with the three of you,” he said, looking left and right for little Milad before finding the baby sucking on a roll of marzipan below the table.

The child had fallen wholly to his care of late, for with Haru readying himself for the tournament and Rei helping the dancers during their rehearsals there was nobody else to look after him. Makoto had been loath to bring him into the kitchens, for fear he should wander too close to the burning ovens, but Haru had settled that by sewing a loop of cloth onto the back of Milad’s frock and tying it to Makoto’s girdle. Milad had been most displeased to find that he could stray no more than two paces away from his guardian’s side, but after leveling a thunderous frown at his father and receiving nothing more than a stern look in return he allowed himself to be consoled by a lapful of sweets, showered upon him by the adoring twins.

“It goes faster so,” said Ren. When his brother bent his head back to the wooden pestle, he whisked a slice of salted apricot out of his robes and slipped it beneath the bench to Milad.

“Take it back and eat it yourself,” said Makoto severely, softening his words with a grin. “Or he shall refuse his supper, and Haru will never let him out of his sight again.”

“Haru-chan could never be angry with you, _onii-chan_ ,” sang Ran, taking the bit of fruit and popping it into her own mouth.

“Indeed he couldn’t,” agreed Ren. Hayato said nothing, for he was busy unsticking a pair of sweetmeats from the press.

“I would have less chatter from the lot of you,” barked Azar, suddenly reappearing at Makoto’s shoulder. “Or I shall give you nothing but bread for your supper, and naught but water to drink.”

Sufficiently energized by her oath, Makoto and the children turned back to their work and for the next hour not a sound was heard from the bench as bit by bit the great heaps of sugared dough and peppercorns were worn away to nothing.

*          *          *

Three days before the beginning of the tournament, the visiting nobles from the Qasrian provinces arrived, each with an army of stewards and squires in attendance. Makoto, Rin, and Haru were obliged to greet them all on the terrace with Masoto and the queen, who sent them off to the chambers that had been prepared for them in the southern wing. They had come from near and far, Haru found—not one of the major citadels had failed to send a delegation to attend the festival. There were parties from Astara and Jarmah, Orhasova and Haifa, Marmayah and Al-Qamr, and twenty-four others that Haru recalled dimly from the seemingly endless letters he had written in the days before and after Makoto awoke from his fevered sleep.

They were most interested to see him, for not all of them had looked favorably upon an alliance of marriage with Iwatobi. Haru had dreaded the meeting, for between the Iwatobian princes, it had always been Aki who could win a contrary heart with no more than a word—but somehow his brother’s gift of charm seemed to have come to him, and those officials who expected to dislike him went away pleasantly surprised.

“Well done, Haru-chan,” muttered Makoto, lifting a brow as the viceroy of Habar bowed before them and set off up the path leading to the entrance hall. “Habar protested your betrothal almost as fiercely as Suhar did, and yet the viceroy seemed as if he had forgotten it after you greeted him.”

“I would not be too happy, Makoto,” cautioned Rin, tilting his head at the pale-skinned easterner advancing with an elderly servant toward the queen. “That is Khashn Masuda, advisor to the lord of Suhar. He came in his liege’s place, though he did not say why when he wrote.”

Haru narrowed his eyes at the man, who was giving his regards to the sultan. “I do not like the look of that one, Rin.”

He said this last in Iwatobian, and was pleased to find himself understood; Rei had taught a little of their native tongue to Rin, Nagisa, and the twins over the months they had spent in Qasr. Makoto cast them a questioning glance, for he had never enough time to join them, and the words were no clearer to him than they would have been to Milad.

“Nor I,” sighed Rin, answering in the common speech.

The Suhrian advisor turned away from Makoto’s parents and came swiftly between the flowerbeds to the place where Rin stood with Rei and the princes. He made them a low bow in the Qasrian fashion—not falling to one knee as the custom was in Iwatobi, but bending sharply at the waist and pausing for an instant before rising again.

“Your Majesty, Lord Matsuoka,” he said, inclining his head to Rin. He did not look at Rei, for his grey eyes slid over the steward’s shoulder as if he were not there at all. When he lifted his face, his gaze fell upon Haru, who looked unflinchingly back without a word.

“So this is the Iwatobian princeling,” said Masuda, glancing from the sapphire coronet upon Haru’s brow to the pointed slippers visible below the skirts of his gown. “Pale as an almond blossom, they said, but it seems the Eastern suns have darkened him to a very man of Qasr.”

“It becomes me well, or so my mother-in-law has told me,” said the younger man, recognizing the note of challenge for what it was.

Masuda said nothing more, bowing again to Makoto before vanishing into the crowd of servants milling about the terrace. Rei made a sound of indignation the moment he was out of earshot, and Rin looked as if he had been hard-pressed to keep himself from spitting after the Suhrian as he departed. Makoto frowned until it seemed as if his forehead would split in two, and at the sight Haru sent him a quelling look and took the elder prince’s hand in his.

“What an unpleasant little man,” Haru remarked. “Is he very like his master, do you think?”

“I have had the misfortune of meeting the brute, and Masuda is more of him than he is of himself,” scoffed the advisor, kicking at a hapless beetle that had wandered too near to his foot. It scampered away into the grass, and doubly aggrieved at having missed it Rin turned to glare in Masuda’s direction.

Rei had parted his lips to ask about the Suhrian viceroy when a cry broke from Makoto’s lips, and as they started up to see what the matter was, the crown prince tore his hand from Haru’s and darted away to his mother’s side. Haru squinted after his friend and gasped as the Qasrian leapt into the embrace of a slender lad with hair the color of an early sunset; Rin’s jaw dropped, and loosing a shriek of joy he barreled down the path and sprang at them both.

“ _Kisumi!_ ” he shouted, wriggling between the two and flinging himself upon the chuckling newcomer. Makoto laughed as his friends swept him into their arms, and for a moment chaos reigned as he and Rin found voice for little more than a string of gleeful exclamations.

“You took long enough in coming back!” cried Rin, standing back at last and setting his hands upon Kisumi’s shoulders. “Why did you not send word to let us know you were returning?”

“I thought it would be better if I came unannounced,” chortled the lad. “I am terribly sorry I missed Ran’s betrothal—and your wedding, Rin! But my Miya was too ill to travel at the time, and of course I could not leave her.”

At this, he drew his wife to his side, and the great grin of pride that crossed his face as Makoto and Rin stooped to kiss her hand brought a faint smile to Haru’s own lips. She was small and narrowly built, shorter even than Nagisa and Gou, with a long plait of chestnut hair and eyes that matched them precisely in hue.

“Aye, Rin nearly had a fit when he heard of your marriage,” said Makoto. “My congratulations to the both of you. Surely you brought back the finest maid in all Sikandar, Kisumi.”

“I thank you, my Lord,” she said, bobbing a bashful curtsy.  Having at last torn his gaze away from his fellow Qasrians, Kisumi looked up to see Haru and Rei hovering curiously at Makoto’s shoulder.

“Who are you, then?” he asked, extending a hand to Rei.

“Rei Ryuugazaki, Lord Shigino,” said the steward, bowing briefly to the elder lad. “Prince Haruka’s manservant.”

“And soon to be the bridegroom of a palace dancer,” said Rin, catching Haru’s hands in his and swinging the reluctant prince by the arm until they were too dizzy to stand alone. “This is Prince Haruka, Ran’s intended—and a better friend I could not have hoped to find, even now that you are back again.”

Kisumi paid no mind to the latter introduction, for his jaw had fallen open as he turned to stare at Rei.

“ _Nagisa?_ ” he asked incredulously, eyes growing wide as Rei’s ears went scarlet. “However did that come about? And how is it that not a single one of you thought to write to me?”

“ _You_ did not write until after you were wed, so you need not say a word,” sang Rin, thumbing his nose at Kisumi. “But from what I have heard, it was all the work of an old tale, the lay of Dahab-E-Noor.”

“I go away for three years and return to find that all of my friends have been wed without me,” he moaned, falling to his knees at Miya’s feet. “What have I done for such luck, sweetheart?”

“You departed when you came of age,” she answered, lifting her brows. “Nearly half the youths of Qasr are wed by eighteen, Kisumi—did you expect the rest to remain spinsters and bachelors for your sake? After all, you were not willing to journey home to marry, were you?”

“Makoto has honored our brotherhood, at least,” he said, bounding up again to embrace the prince. “Have you chosen a lady to court, then?”

Makoto flushed until he looked like a rose, and turning away from his friend he called to his mother, who kicked off her dainty slipper and delivered a sharp blow across Kisumi’s backside. He yelped and whirled about to face her, rubbing his behind with a wince.

“Aunty!” he cried, shooting her a reproachful glance. “I have been home for less than an hour, and the first thing you do is strike me with your shoes as if I were a lad of six again!”

“Enough of your tomfoolery, my son,” she said, softening her glance with a swift smile. “Your mother and father have waited for you too long, and it is time they met your bride. You married without their leave, child, and though Lord Shigino will not say a word about it you ought to have come back to us to wed.”

Kisumi stooped to kiss her, dodging her slipper again as he took Miya’s arm and ushered her away toward the entrance hall.

“I shall see you at the feast, Makoto!” he bellowed, looking over his shoulder as he pulled his giggling wife after him between the chattering guests. Once the couple had vanished into the crowd, Natsuko and Rin put their hands upon their knees and burst into laughter.

“Three years away,” smiled the queen, accepting her son’s shoulder to draw herself upright again. “And yet it is as if he never left our halls, is it not?”

“Indeed,” chuckled Makoto, whose cheeks were the color of sakura blossoms. Masoto said nothing, for he looked as if Kisumi’s teasing had called a half-remembered thought to mind.

At last all the arriving delegates had greeted the royal pair, and the princes were permitted to withdraw to their chambers to prepare for the feast. Rin made off for his own rooms and bounded into his bathtub, which Sakura had filled for him before accompanying Seijurou to the practice ring. Makoto and Haru ran arm-in-arm through the palace to the third level, laughing as giddily as if they were a pair of children again, eager for the first night of the festival to begin.

“Do you think there shall be candied saffron?” gasped Haru, clinging to Makoto’s hand as the Qasrian tugged him up a flight of steps. “It has been a year or more since I tasted it, and I promised to send a jar back to Aki if I found any.”

Makoto stopped in his tracks and smiled, stricken anew by how dear Haru was to him. It was nearly five months now since he had come to Qasr, and in the span of seasons the Iwatobian’s name had been enshrined in Makoto’s heart, gaining passage into the prince’s most beloved thoughts as only the children had done before him.

“The confectioners will sell it by the pavilion, I am sure,” he said, warmth stealing over his shoulders at the silvery peal of Haru’s laughter.

And with that Makoto went to his own room to bathe and dress, feeling somehow as if all the world had changed.

*          *          *

Haru looked approvingly at the gown Rei had tossed over the foot of the bed for him, one of the garments he had commissioned after leaving home. It was a stark black, embroidered from collar to hem in scarlet thread that shone under the flickering torchlight. A vermilion sash cut sharply across the robe from hip to knee on either side, and the matching slippers were as red as blood. That night they were to celebrate the Goddess in her fiercer form, and so Rei passed by the sapphires and gold that Haru loved best for a set of inky fireglass.

Once Haru was dressed and adorned, Rei took a crimson turban from the cupboard and set it upon Haru’s brow, clasping a piece of dragon’s breath over his forehead to hold the cloth together. The prince held still before the mirror, watching as Rei swept aside the pot of powdered gold to reach the dish of charcoal, smudging the dust over Haru’s eyelids so that when he looked into the glass again they were veiled in shadow. His eyes had darkened nearly to violet, matching the jewel between his eyes as he glittered like a gem by the light of the dying lamp.

“There, we are ready,” said Rei, looking down at his own garments. Haru had commissioned a twin of his own robe for his friend, but to set the two apart he had asked that Rei’s sash and stitching be blue instead of red.

They hung a pair of sabres from their belts and left the chamber, meeting the others in the corridor beyond. Makoto stood with Nagisa and the twins; Hayato had gone to his family’s chambers to see his brother. Ran and Ren were clad in mahogany satin, and Makoto in heavy velvet that matched them precisely in hue.

“Shall we go?” asked Makoto, swinging Milad up to his shoulders. Ran caught fast to one of his sleeves, while Ren took Rei’s hand in his own. Haru went on ahead to meet Rin, who descended from the fourth level with Seijurou and Gou just as he reached the stairs.

“Where are Sakura and Momo?” he inquired, glancing over Gou’s shoulder for the younger two Mikoshibas.

“They went down to the square at sundown,” she said. “The rest of the troupe gathered there to ready the stage an hour ago, I think.”

The palace had come to life that night, and as they went through the halls they saw that every alcove and windowsill was alight with fragrant candles, shining against the dark to beckon the Goddess over the threshold. The visiting nobles were flying this way and that, their trains gathering on the tile like pools of mulled wine as they passed.

At last they reached the entrance hall and began the walk down to the marketplace, where the goddess’s pavilion had been raised in the square the previous day. The shops lay still and silent under the starry sky, but in the square four great fires crackled at each corner of the perimeter, bathing the cream-colored tent in a ruddy glow. Through the arched doorway they could see the carven figure of Mother Isha, who was wrapped in a garment of red silk and covered from head to foot in scarlet flowers. A row of dishes burned with crimson flame before her, and from where they stood the party glimpsed a crowd of worshippers kneeling by the altar. A pair of young women flanked the goddess on either side, one with a drum slung over her shoulder and the other playing the strings as she sang. Haru stopped in his tracks, for he had never heard the age-old prayer in the Qasrian tongue, and after his efforts of the previous month the musical words were clear to him at last.

_Thou art the Queen, the gatherer of treasures, first in my heart_

_She who enters into every house, each as a palace to Thee_

_Through Thou I am sustained, through Thy grace I see, breathe, hear the World outspoken._

_Thou who liveth in the eyes of Mahar, casting its light over Me_

_Thou hast but to speak a word, and men and gods kneel before Thee_

_Who maketh the soul of thy love exceeding mighty, one who knows Thy strength_

_And bendeth the bow for thee so that evil might be slain by Fire,_

_Rousing battle so it be sped by flame, Thou who gave life to Earth and Heaven both_

_And on the world’s summit brought forth Sky the Father, thy home in the waters, in the sea as Mother._

_Thou within each living creature, as much their own as Thine, their shapes as clay to Thee_

_Thou who brought Life into being alone, dwelling like Air within them_

_All that is Good art Thou, thine excellence dwelling in Everything.”_

They gathered together, taking the little ones by the hand and drawing close to the altar. The crowd parted before them, and Makoto stooped by the goddess’s feet and beckoned one of the worshippers to take the tray of fruit and flowers he held and prepare them for offering.

The princes prayed in silence, while Nagisa, Rin, and the children murmured into their folded palms. Nagisa’s hopes were wholly for his wedded life with Rei, and from where he knelt by Makoto, Haru could see a steady flush rising on the steward’s face. He heard neither Rin’s prayers nor the twins’, and as he finished his own he glimpsed Seijurou and Gou accepting a garland of roses from the elder of the two musicians.

Haru looked up at the Goddess, who gazed out into the night as she had always done during the festivals he recalled from the past—black-eyed and black-haired, her skin as golden as wheat, and her lips as red as blood. He prayed again for Aki’s happiness with Jun and then for Ran’s with Hayato, thinking of the betrothal contract hidden below the mattress in his chambers. He had grown to love the princess dearly, and at last he knew fiercely Aki adored him—for Ran and Ren were sister and brother to him now, and to speed their joy he would slaughter his own in a heartbeat. Already he ached at the thought of leaving them, and struck with remorse at the thought of his cousin in Iwatobi he resolved to hasten his departure from Atar Qasr.

But he did not choose for himself alone—Nagisa would travel with them, and he doubted the dancer would like to be parted from the others, even for the sake of journeying to Iwatobi. Haru himself was not eager to go, for day by day the folk of the palace grew nearer to his heart: Makoto and the children, Sakura and Gou, Rin and the Mikoshiba brothers…

“Haru-chan?”

He glanced up and saw that the others had risen, leaving him the last one kneeling on the woven mat before the altar. He accepted Makoto’s hand and rose to his feet, and together they departed the pavilion for the opposite end of the square, where lines of stalls selling ornaments and sweets were set up the previous morning. At the far side was the great wooden stage, where the dancing troupe was to perform their first piece for the festival. Nagisa bid them goodbye and rushed away to join them, vanishing into the darkness as the rest of the party looked about in excitement at the merriment that surrounded them.

“What shall we do while we wait for the performance?” asked Rei, pushing his spectacles back to the bridge of his nose. “It will be half an hour or more, and we cannot sit by the stage until then.”

“ _I_ am going to taste the roasted lamb that Momo spoke of yesterday,” said Rin, and Haru stifled a snort of laughter at the sight of the advisor’s tongue flickering over his pointed teeth. “Will you come, Rei?”

“Aye,” said the steward, turning to look at Haru and Makoto. “And you?”

“We passed a fortuneteller’s booth perhaps five minutes ago,” suggested Gou, pointing down a row of tents painted green and purple. “Sei and I are going to the confectioner’s stall.”

“Can’t we go with them?” begged the children, pulling at their governess’s hands. They looked back at their brother, who sighed and nodded his assent. With that, the party scattered into the shadows—Rei and Rin to the cooks’ row and Sei and Gou to the sweet-vendors, leaving Haru and Makoto alone with Milad.

“Shall we go, then?” asked the Qasrian, brushing a fallen leaf from Milad’s hair. Haru took his hand and followed him between the tents, halting when they reached a little pavilion at the very end of the alley. He crossed the threshold and blinked at the sudden light, for within the tent a brazier burned by a window cut into the canvas, sending plumes of smoke into the starry evening. An elderly woman sat stirring the coals, and as they entered she glanced up with a smile. Behind her there was a table lined with rows of polished bone—rabbits’ legs and the shells of desert _salihafas,_ the skulls of birds and the shanks of goats and sheep.

“Come forth,” she said, drawing her mantle closer about her shoulders as she motioned them towards her. She looked first at Makoto and then at Milad, chuckling softly as the baby’s eyes grew wide at the sight of the smouldering coals.

“We wish to know our fortunes, _jadati_ ,” he said, bowing to her. “What is your price?”

“A silver pence for each, my Lord,” she answered. “I will ask nothing for the child’s, for until he is old enough to hold the rod himself I cannot speak for its truth.”

Makoto nodded and seated himself upon a narrow chair, tugging Haru down beside him. The priestess took a slender knife from her robes and heated it over the fire; as they waited for the blade to pale, Makoto went to the long counter and returned with a _salihafa_ , laying the shell on a slab of inky stone. At last the woman passed him the knife, and with bated breath they watched him press the flat of the blade to the bone. It cracked where the steel had burned it, leaving a pattern of lines like a spider’s web from end to end.

She bent forward and took the shell from his hands, drawing it close to her eyes as she tilted it this way and that.

“Your luck is fair, my lad,” she said. “Your wealth will grow again, and the strength of your line shall endure. There is no word of illness here, and your fondest hope shall be fulfilled—and when you realize your love it shall be returned to you a hundredfold. ”

Makoto blushed at this last, and Haru snickered into his sleeve. The priestess turned back to the shell again and frowned, bringing it near the flames.

“But there is a death awaiting you,” she said quietly. The Qasrian blanched, and for a moment Haru saw his friend’s lips quiver in the firelight. “You cannot escape it, for it draws close even now—you can do nothing to alter this, and before you are past your youth it will have come and gone.”

“Whose?” asked Makoto.

“Of one dearer to you than life, my prince,” she murmured. “I am sorry.”

Haru wrapped an arm about Makoto’s shoulders and looked at the thing for himself. The priestess had spoken truly, for the crosswise line of evil fate and the double notch of a passing were etched clearly together upon the shell like the sigils of a grave. The priestess put the bone aside and asked for the day and hour of Milad’s birth, and after a minute the princes realized they did not know it.

“We shall have go back and ask the woman in the marketplace,” said Haru, frowning as he took his son into his arms and let him stand in his lap. “She and his mother were friends—perhaps she would know.”

“I cannot cast the bones for him, then,” sighed the woman. “When were you born, son of the West?”

“On the last day of Aran-hazad, nineteen years ago,” said the Iwatobian. “It was an hour before sunset, or so my father said.”

"A water spirit, then," she said, lifting a brand in the shape of the _ma’an_ rune out of the fire and holding it out to him. "Go on, my Lord."

Haru took the iron with steady hands and brought it down upon the curving rib of a camel, watching as a net of cracks spread over the weathered bone. He held still for a moment before she raised her finger, and as he withdrew he saw her eyes darken at once as she gazed down upon his handiwork. Haru hissed at the sight of it; his bone did not have Makoto’s foreboding, but still it was none too kind.

The priestess buried the iron under the coals again and offered him a tray of herbs. Haru shook his head, for from what little he recalled of divining he knew his oracle had not foretold a pleasant year.

"Choose what you will for me," he said, and glanced swiftly to his left at Makoto, who looked as if he had frozen to his chair.

"Elm and hawthorn, Highness," she replied, plucking a handful of dried twigs from the tray and pouring them into a bag of sakura petals. Both to guard you, and hemlock for caution."

"He has no need of such a thing," said Makoto. His voice had grown rough with fear, and he looked down at the sprig of hemlock as if it were an evil omen until Haru dropped a pair of silver coins into the priestess’s palm and tucked the sachet into his girdle.

"Still I will give it," she insisted, closing Haru's fist over the square of linen. "Keep them near, my prince."

The princes thanked her and departed in poor spirits, and as they returned to the square Makoto held Haru’s hand fast in his own, refusing to relinquish it for so much as an instant. Haru said nothing as the Qasrian entwined their fingers together, for while he cared little for his own fate he could not bear the thought of Makoto’s suffering—not after spending the better part of a month sitting by his bed in the healing halls, praying night and day that he would awaken again.

“Do you think she spoke truly?” asked the Qasrian, breaking the silence as they drew up to the rows of cushions before the flowered stage.

“Aki practiced divining when we were lads, and I learned a little until he gave it up,” shrugged Haru. “She did not lie, that is certain—and neither have I known the bones to be falsehood in all my days.”

“That is what I feared,” he sighed, bringing Haru closer to his side. “Yours foretold peril, did it not?”

“Aye, but let us think no more of it,” urged the younger lad. “Look! they are beginning.”

Makoto turned to look at the dais, where the hanging lamps had sprung to life as one, casting a crimson glow over the crowd. The dais grew bright beneath them, and the torches in the square were extinguished.

As Haru squinted in the sudden darkness, he saw the dancers standing upon the stage, their arms outstretched to the heavens as they glittered in the rosy light. Sakura and Nagisa stood hand-in-hand before the others, waiting for the first chords of the hymn to strike them. The musicians lifted their instruments and began, stirring the troupe to life as the notes flew thick and fast about their feet. They were dancing a myth that Haru had heard time and again in his childhood, of the Goddess claiming a mortal shell for a night through the glory of her songs, and returning it to its keeper at daybreak before returning to the heavens again.

Sakura was the very soul of beauty, weaving back and forth across the soil, and when she met Nagisa in an embrace they were friends no longer, but a vixen and her prey—one with eyes gleaming in the shadow like a panther’s, and the other wholly transfixed by the vision she had become.

 _Come unto me, and I shall send you mad,_ she whispered, and Nagisa wove towards her as if drawn by threads of steel.

 _Come unto me, and you shall be mine,_ promised Sakura, and Rei’s eyes grew wide as the light seemed to pass from Nagisa’s face, leaving his heart bare to the huntress standing before him. He staggered into her beckoning arms, and after brushing the hair from his brow she bent to kiss his cheek.

He had fallen to her enchantment, and as he rose to take up the dance again he did not move as he had done before he saw her—the movements were fluid past the grace of man, as if Sakura’s body had been drawn into his own like smoke into water. It was not Nagisa who spun below the lamps, but a goddess clad in golden silk and jade, having taken his flesh for her own as she descended from her home among the stars. The flutes took up the swelling strain, and as if by some power greater than his Nagisa was driven to follow, shaking the bells upon his dusty feet as he circled after Sakura like a stricken lover in the breathless night. They were one as the souls of men could not hope to be, for it was as if a single thought lingered in their bodies, bending them both to its will at once.

On and on they circled, breaking away from one another now and then to join hands with Momo and Malka, who swept between them as if to draw them apart. But Nagisa’s eyes did not leave her as she leapt back and forth across the stage, and though she looked as if she did not see him their dance brought them together again, as if she had contrived it by calling him wordlessly to her side. By and by Nagisa seemed to grow weary, although Haru and Rei knew it to be nothing more than pretence—for Sakura danced on, and a moment later Nagisa collapsed upon the dais and laid his head upon his arms as if the mortal body was spent at last, having obeyed the whims of a goddess for a night when it had known nothing heavier than the earthly labors of its master.

The assembly roared its approval, and for an instant the dancers were lost behind a shower of pink and orange blossoms flung to the dais from the guests below. They were gone in a heartbeat, leaving the stage for a band of traveling acrobats from Orhasova. The twins were nearly beside themselves at their somersaults and springs, and scrambled up to Seijurou’s shoulders to see over the heads of the crowd. A family of musicians followed, one that lived in the citadel itself—a pair of bards from Haifa, who sang the lay of Dahab-E-Noor as the custom was at that time of year. Rei took Nagisa’s hand as the words washed over them, fondly remembering how the old tale had played a hand in their romance as they prepared for the betrothal night so long ago. Haru hardly noticed the performers as they came and went, for he was swiftly falling asleep where he sat, nodding off against Makoto’s shoulder.

A single note echoed through the darkness, deeper and brighter than the Haifan horns and the Suhrian bells, and at the sound Haru rubbed his eyes and raised his head to see Natsuko standing alone upon the dais. The palace musicians knelt by the stage, coaxing a haunting melody from the strings as Natsuko began to dance. Her movements held nothing of the fire that had filled Sakura’s and Nagisa’s some hours previously, and as the sleep left the Iwatobian’s brow he shot upright in Makoto’s arms and stared at his mother-in-law. There was weariness lingering in the arch of her slender brows, and upon her lips there hung an ache that Haru had known all too keenly since coming to Qasr—the sorrow of a soul parted too long from home, and at once Haru remembered that among the gathering only he had shared in her sadness.

It seemed as if the cry of a lonely maiden rang out across the guttering breeze,  and the Iwatobian turned to his friend to see that Makoto’s face was unchanged, for such a weight was alien to him, and the elder prince could not hope to understand it. Makoto clapped on with the rest, and in that moment Haru knew his friend was blind to the truth.

Makoto had watched his mother's performance at every autumn festival, seen it as part and parcel of the queen herself—but as she stood upon the dais and danced with all the might of an ocean storm, Haru read the grief in Natsuko's eyes and felt his own grow damp at the sight of the silver tears snaking down her cheek. It was no longer the queen of Qasr who stood before him, but the Martulian princess of elder days, invoking the rise and fall of rolling waters with the skirts of her gown, the petals of woodland flowers with the oil on her curling lashes, the sandstone of a palace set high above the shore with the palms of her long-fingered hands.

Though the light that bathed her burned like the setting sun, beneath the swinging lamps she shone cool as a lily, the white silk of her robe mingling with violet and green like a patch of monkshood floating upon the sea. The madness of the swelling strain rose higher until Haru was sure it would break, but at last she sprang into the finishing step and vanished amidst a shower of roses. When she gathered them up into her arms and bent to greet the wide-eyed children that swarmed onto the dais behind her, the spell was broken—Natsuko donned her veil once more, and in the sudden stillness she dashed the tears from her face and was herself again.

But the next moment she lowered her eyes to meet Haru’s, and the words were clear in her gaze, ringing through the night like the bells of a forest shrine.

_It shall never cease to grieve you, not as long as you live._

And with that she returned to her husband’s side, leaving the platform for a fire-eater from Al-Qamr. Haru sat quietly by Makoto, having understood what she meant—that he would never be whole again if he made his home in Qasr, never know the freedom of his boyhood if his heart were to be cloven between two kingdoms. He sighed and buried his face in Milad’s hair, for he knew that it would be either his fate or Ran’s to suffer Natsuko’s pain if he married the little girl after her coming-of-age—and resolved anew that it should never be, that whether by wit or force he would bring Ran and Hayato together if it was his last deed upon earth. He loved them both far too fiercely to see them parted, and unconsciously he reached for Makoto’s hand and squeezed it until the Qasrian gasped at the pain.

“Haru,” he said, gently freeing himself from the younger prince’s grasp. “What is it, _amarya?_ ”

He came out of his daze, having only dimly recognized that Makoto was speaking to him—and promptly forgot it, for the twins were barreling toward him so swiftly that Ren was stumbling over the train of his robe.

“Haru-chan!” Ran and Ren flung themselves into his arms, tucking their faces into his neck as Milad squalled in protest from beneath them. “Wasn’t that fire-eater magnificent?” crowed Ran, whisking Milad up into her arms and spinning in a circle until she was too dizzy to stand upright.

“Aye, he was,” answered Haru, deciding not to confess that he had hardly noticed the man. “Are the performances finished, then?”

Ren pouted, giving the Iwatobian all the answer he needed. He loosed a peal of laughter and ruffled the boy’s hair before stretching and rising to his feet.

“We ought to return home, then,” he yawned, plucking Milad from Ran’s shoulders and giving him to Makoto. “What say you, little ones?”

“I want my supper,” Ran announced, and swarmed up Haru’s legs to perch upon his back. “Ride on, Haru-chan!”

“Ran!” cried her brother, who was left without a mount of her own.

“I shall carry you, Ren,” said Seijurou, popping out of the darkness with his wife and sister on his arm; a glance over his shoulder answered for Rin’s whereabouts, as the redheaded advisor was fighting with Nagisa and Momo over a bowl of sugared lemon. Ren shrieked with glee and bounded into Sei’s arms, crowing with triumph that now he stood higher than Ran. Gou shook her head and pried her brother away from the younger lads, dragging him off up the path by his ear as he shrieked back at the pair of dancers. The others followed, and as they made their way toward the main road that led up to the palace not one of them noticed the band of men watching them vanish into the dark.

“He is as close to the throne as if he was one of theirs,” grumbled the shortest of the lot, knocking out his gilded pipe and stowing it away in his robes.

“Aye, our master spoke truly,” sighed another. “And if His Highness does not wed he shall be king!”

“Wait until after the tournament,” said an elderly fellow, narrowing his eyes. “If they have taken him to their bosoms there is nothing left to us, and we shall know by then.”

*          *          *

_It had haunted him too long, he thought._

_He found himself in the feasting hall yet again, watching Hayato and Ran pass into the chamber with Rei at his heels. The three sprigs of emerald drew Makoto’s gaze as lodestones drew iron, and try as he might he could not look away. Night after night the vision dogged his dreams, and as he glanced across at Ren—standing nearly as high as Makoto himself—he went swiftly to one of the tables and slit his palm from end to end with a carving knife, crying out in anguish as the blood welled from his flesh without leaving an ounce of pain in its wake._

_“Tell me, I beg of you!” he cried, turning his face to the heavens and clasping his hands in despair. “I cannot bear this any longer—tell me how I may save him!”_

_But no answer came, and he was forced to remain where he stood until he felt his head grow heavy. He fell to his knees, for suddenly his legs would not bear his weight, and before his eyes the chamber seemed to shatter into pieces as he descended into darkness._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much to all my readers for all your support! I'm so glad to have had the chance to share this fic with you all, and I wish all of you the best for the holidays! Chapter 11 is underway, and should be up within the next two weeks if I stick to my writing schedule :) Check out all the illustrations in previous chapters if you haven't already, and thank you to alsas for the oneshot prompt!


	11. The Beginning of the End

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the festival goes on and the tournament begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MORE ILLUSTRATIONS!
> 
> [Milad, Makoto, and Haru at the festival](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/169666587936/they-are-nearly-as-fair-to-look-upon-as-your)

“What do you _mean_ , onii-chan?”

It was the morning of the tournament, and Hayato and the twins rose from their beds to find Haru missing from his chambers. Makoto and Milad were there alone, for Haru had gone down to the archery pit with Rei.

“He cannot wear your favors today, Ran,” sighed the elder prince. “They are neither jousting nor sparring, and he will have no armor on.”

“But we shan’t even know which one he is!” wailed Ren, clutching at his brother’s tunic. “You _always_ showed us your hood before the matches began!”

Makoto rubbed at his temples and held out a hand.

“I will see if Rei can take the ribbons to him, then,” he said, capitulating before the film of tears gathering in Hayato’s eyes. The children brightened and dropped the bits of satin into his palm: green for Ran, brown for Ren, and lavender for Hayato. Makoto pocketed them and hurried the twins away to their own apartments, where Gou was waiting to ready them for the day.

“Into the bath, now,” she ordered, so briskly that Hayato and Ren scurried away to the washroom at once. “Are you going to the stands, Makoto?”

“Aye,” he answered, tying the laces on Milad’s little boots. “The others are there but for Momo and Nagisa—they are waiting for the three of you in the entrance hall.”

She nodded her thanks and ushered him out into the corridor, whereupon he made his way to the east wing of the ground floor, which housed the archery pit and the practice ring. Both were surrounded by vaulted seats, rising like steps to the heavy doors. The stands were usually empty but for those soldiers waiting their turn to shoot or spar, but that day the archery pit was crowded to the wings with visiting nobles and the folk of the citadel, eager to watch the guards at their craft. Rin and Kisumi had wrested a row for themselves, lounging carelessly over the railing as they waited for the rest to arrive. Miya sat primly by her husband’s side, looking down at the serving boys readying the targets in the pit below.

“Makoto!” cried Kisumi, waving a hand in greeting. “Where are the others?”

“Haru, Sei, and Sakura are at the champions’ tents, and Rei is attending Haru,” said the prince, dropping Milad into Rin’s lap and falling onto the bench beside him. “Gou is with the children, and Momo and Nagisa waited behind to escort them.”

“What is the tale of the child, then?” asked his friend, putting out a hand for Milad to grasp. “He has Prince Haruka’s hair exactly—are they brothers?”

“Nay, Haru has only an elder cousin,” answered Makoto. “Milad came to us the week he arrived in Qasr—the scaffolding gave way on a house in the south quarter, and Milad’s mother was one of the masons killed in the accident. Haru took him as his ward, and since then the little one has been with us.”

“Poor thing,” sighed Kisumi, permitting Milad to inspect the pearl clasps at his collar. “Will he go back with the Iwatobians when they leave?”

Makoto nodded, feeling his eyes grow damp at the thought of Haru’s impending departure.

“I shall miss him dreadfully,” he breathed, laughing as the baby buried his hands in Kisumi’s sunset hair. “I had forgotten what it was like to have small ones about—it is so long since the twins were tots themselves,  and perhaps by the time he returns next summer he will have forgotten me.”

Rin put out his hand and grasped Makoto’s shoulder.

“Steady on, Makoto,” he whispered. “Gou and the others have come.”

The children joined them on the bench, arrayed in identical gowns of scarlet, gold, and blue—smaller replicas of Makoto’s own, which matched his heir’s diadem precisely. Gou came close on their heels with Momo and Nagisa, who were clad in robes of white and red. Makoto rose to his feet and slipped out into the aisle, leaving Milad behind with Rin as he bounded down to the level where the champions had sequestered themselves away behind a tasselled curtain. A pair of guards stood before the drapes, kicking their heels at the wall as they waited for the matches to begin.

“Highness,” gasped the younger of the two, springing to attention and bowing before the prince. “Do you wish to come through?”

“Nay, I know I ought not to see them,” he laughed. “You know Prince Haruka’s manservant, do you not?”

“Aye, the one with the spectacles,” nodded the sentry. “Shall I bring him out to you?”

“If you would,” said Makoto. “The children wished to give him favors for Haru to wear.”

The lad bowed once more and vanished behind the curtains, leaving his gilded lance behind him. Makoto heard him calling amongst the chattering soldiers for Rei, and a few moments later a set of footsteps approached the entrance again. First came the little sentry, who scampered back to his place and took up his spear—closely followed by Haru himself, dressed in a fitted tunic of violet and green with a dark hood drawn low upon his forehead.

“Haru!” gasped the prince, for by custom the champions did not show their faces to the spectators until the tournament’s end. They were masked and hooded while shooting, and during combat they wore helms that veiled them from brow to chin.

“Sanim said you had favors for me,” said the Iwatobian, laughing at the astonishment in Makoto’s eyes. “I shall be the only one to wear them today, but no matter.”

“They are from the little ones,” said the elder lad, drawing the scraps of ribbon from his girdle. Haru took them and made to tie the streamers to his collar, but they were far too short for a proper knot and tumbled to the floor the moment he let them go.

“Here,” chuckled Makoto, unpinning the brooch that held his sash to his gown. He laid the ribbons side by side upon Haru’s shoulder and pierced them with the golden pin, tucking the point into the catch so that the ivory rose nestled upon a bed of skeleton leaves by the prince’s neck. The bits of green and yellow silk shone up through the filigree like dewdrops taking their color from the petals below, and when Makoto drew back to look at him Haru laid his hand over the blossom as if it were a living thing, priceless as a pearl and lovely beyond measure.

“Does it look well, then?” He tilted his chin to the right in an effort to see the ornament for himself, chuckling under his breath at the ragged ends of satin.

“Aye, it does,” said the Qasrian, taking Haru’s hands in his. “ _Haza saeida,_ Haru-chan.”

The younger prince nodded his thanks, and with that he turned away and vanished behind the drapes. Makoto remained outside the curtains for a moment longer before mounting the stairs to the row where Rin sat with the others. Hayato and the twins set upon him the instant he emerged into the box, clambering onto his lap and shrieking in his ears.

Gou lifted her brows in warning, and after quailing like mice under her gaze they settled into their seats beside her and whispered among themselves until a horn rang out in the pit below. The curtains before the gate at the far end were drawn back to admit the line of champions, dressed in embroidered trousers and tunics with bows and quivers on their backs. There were a hundred and fifty of them in all, nobles from the neighboring provinces and soldiers under Seijurou’s command. They were dressed from head to foot in the white, violet, and green of the Qasrian seal, though the vivid patterns differed greatly from one to the next.

A group of slender champions standing by the east wall wore garments embroidered with laurel wreaths, while the tallest of the lot bore an image of the Qasrian fig on his back. It was the General himself, for though only his eyes flickered over the cloth across his nose and mouth his height and build betrayed him. Makoto searched among the men for Haru, whom he found amidst a band of boys with only the slightest hint of white upon their robes.

Haru’s gown was the pale green of young leaves in the spring, lighter by far than the hue of the Qasrian flag. It was hemmed in deep purple, and the leather vambraces on his arms were the color of cream. The pattern crossing his tunic was of a hemlock bough, and between the shadows of his mask and hood his eyes shone out like sapphires twinkling up from the depths of a mine.

“Where is Haru?” asked Rin, leaning out over the rail as he looked for their absent friend. “Is he the one with peacock feathers on his jerkin?”

Makoto shook his head. “I shall not say a word on the matter,” he teased. “After all, the champions are to remain masked until they are bested.”

“Did Rei take our favors, onii-chan?” asked Ran, plucking at her brother’s sleeve.

“They reached the hand for whom they were meant,” he promised, squinting down at the box where his mother and father sat with Lord and Lady Shigino. The sultan nodded at one of the councilmen standing in the field below, and slowly a pair of serving boys on either side of the pit drew the targets up into the air by a length of sturdy rope. The crowd burst into a storm of applause, and after the opening hymn the matches began.

*          *          *

“At least it was the single bow,” said Momo, wringing his hands as Malka came up to join them. The first bouts were finished, and twenty champions had unmasked themselves amidst a shower of roses dropped from the stands. Malka had been one of the first stricken from the ranks, for she had fumbled her last shot and missed the target entirely.

“That is only because the longbows are this afternoon,” she laughed, accepting the roll he had brought for her. The gathering had broken for luncheon, and the remaining champions were dining together in the pavilion. Malka had chosen to join the others in the wings instead, and after she finished her meal Momo handed her a nosegay of lilies, which he had bought from the growing-houses that morning.

“They are lovely,” she said, kissing his cheek in thanks before burying her nose in the largest of the blooms.

Rei rolled his eyes at the pair of them and occupied himself with a basket of bread and mutton that Azar had sent up from the kitchens. He divided the portions between Nagisa and Rin before passing the parcel to Makoto, who took a skewer of meat for himself and relinquished the rest to the twins.

“Why didn’t Haru come up to dine with us?” asked Hayato, diving back into the basket for a piece of honey loaf.

“It is custom that he remains with the others until the ending ceremony,” said the steward. He straightened his spectacles and glanced down to the narrow passage that led to the champions’ pavilion, where he had left his master sitting between the elder Mikoshibas. “And he sent me from the pavilion after his bouts were over, so I came to join you.”

“Why?” inquired Rin. His gaze flickered across the stands to follow Rei’s, and he frowned at the sight of a pair of servants carrying platters along the corridor to the guards standing watch by the drapes.

“He wished to sleep for an hour before the longbows,” answered Rei. “Milad was feverish last night, and Haru did not shut his eyes until dawn.”

Makoto frowned. “He did not wake me.”

“Nay, he would not have,” said the manservant, whisking a bag of sugared almonds out of Nagisa’s hands. “You have yet to regain your strength, and he would happily go without a wink himself if you might rest easily in return.”

Ran and Ren exchanged a pair of mirthful looks before turning their faces away from their brother, who had taken the baby into his arms to feel his brow and listen at his heart.

“Milad seems well enough,” sighed the prince. “But for Haru to do such a thing—”

“Oh, leave it,” said Nagisa, who had seen the children’s glances and knew at once what they meant. “When will the champions finish their dinners?”

“The tournament ought to begin again at the second bell,” called Rin, pulling a silver timepiece out of his robes. Nagisa leapt up onto the bench to look at the great candle that stood burning above the entrance to the outer corridor, clutching at the steward’s hair to keep himself from stumbling.

“Another quarter-hour,” groaned Momo, slumping back onto Kisumi’s shoulder. “I ought to have been a champion myself and been spared the pain of waiting.”

“Aye, indeed,” sang Gou, upending the empty basket over the young dancer’s face. “You who fled the practice ring when your father sent you to train with the guards, and wailed until you were black in the face when he found you hidden under Azar’s baking-table.”

Malka buried her face in her hood to muffle her snickers, and Momo cried out in protest before springing at his sister-in-law.

“Gently, Momo,” scolded Makoto, for Milad was standing on the Gou’s lap and inspecting her tail of crimson hair. The younger lad settled for sprawling across Malka and Rin, who looked as if they would very much like to be elsewhere.

“ _Gou_ ,” complained the dancer, licking the crumbs off his fingers. “I was scarcely a month past my tenth birthday, and the first soldier that greeted me in the ring was taller than onii-chan is now. He gave me a shield heavier than I was and flung a practice blade at my toes—is it any wonder he frightened me so?”

“And your mother apprenticed you to the performers’ guild the very next morning,” said the young scholar, going on without a hint of mercy. Momo groaned and rolled over to glare up at Rin, who shut his eyes in exasperation and turned his face to the vaulted ceiling rather than look down upon the younger lad.

It was then that the heavy gong hanging in the entrance hall sounded the hour, and the note carried throughout the palace like the voice of a temple bell echoing upon the breeze. Momo sat up at once, striking his brow on his brother-in-law’s chin as he rose. Rin shoved him away with an oath and retreated to sit on Malka’s other side, muttering under his breath as he gazed over the balustrade to the ring below

The champions filed out into the arena again, each with a longbow slung upon his back. Makoto squinted down into the arena and saw Haru standing alone by a group of lads dressed all in white. He stood as if he were part of the weapon himself—as if his muscled arms were wrought of honeyed yew, as if the sinews of his neck had lent their power to the quavering string. His insignia—a pale-crested wave breaking below a golden cliff—was drawn from the urn, and the soldiers pulled away like the waning tide before him as he advanced to the sash drawn across the floor.

The two were one, man and weapon—neither could be whole without its fellow, and to his astonishment Makoto saw more of his friend in the bow than he had seen of the bow in Haru. The carvings upon the wood recalled him to Haru’s silver and sapphire circlet, the one he had worn on the night of the welcoming feast—the fluted grip looked as if it had been made for the alabaster fingers that curled about it, while the rising and falling limbs were the image of sloping shoulders, meeting at the curve of the Iwatobian’s spine.

The clear-cut lines of Haru’s face were thrown into sharp relief by the sunbeams filtering down beside him, muffled as they were by the silk of his emerald veil—and in a single movement he lifted his arms and drew the cobalt feathers to his cheek. The dark lashes fluttered down to rest upon their snowy beds, and for a moment longer he stood as motionless as the graven figure of a god, pausing before the target like the breath before a storm.

At once the sooty fans rose up again, and his hand flowed like a stream from the shaft, permitting the barb to leave his keeping and begin its flight. The arrow darted from his grasp, and to the silent watchers in the wings it seemed to linger by his face, brushing his rosy lips in passing before parting the breathless air and piercing the bale of straw to its heart. A cheer rang out from the gathered guests, for the shot struck true—fired with all the strength in his slender body and cleaving through the hay until it smote the stile of wood bracing it to the hanging line. Haru turned to his right and shot again—and again the arrow flew from his side like a falcon leaving its master’s shoulder. Rei’s hands rose to his mouth as he remembered the brother he knew from his boyhood—who laughed with abandon and wept with the might of a monsoon, who loved with the will of the scorching sands and cared nothing for those who dared to look upon him in anger.

That soul had perished long ago, mired in the fears of a careful heart and locked away where neither Aki nor Rei could reach him, but under the gentle warmth of the Qasrian sun he burst into flower again. Rei glimpsed them both in the dart of ocean blue, the princes to whom he had devoted his life, and the younger awoken at last from the grief they learned in their youth.

But at once it was not joy that ran through Haruka’s blood, for something greater than happiness had drawn him from his shell. Rei leaned out over the balustrade and looked down upon his master, and when the thought struck him at last he threw back his head and loosed a shout of laughter.

_O, praise Heaven_ — _he is free!_

_*          *          *_

Ninety champions were stricken from the ranks while shooting with the longbows that afternoon, and of the hundred and fifty that began the day only sixty remained to face the next round of matches. Haru disrobed in the shelter of the pavilion, emerging after the fifth bell in a yellow sash and tunic. The twins set upon him the moment he parted the drapes, flinging their arms about his waist and nearly knocking him back to the floor.

“Haru-chan, you were beautiful!” cried Ran, nearly weeping for joy when she found her brother’s ivory rose pinning the set of ribbons to his shoulder. Makoto laughed at the sight, for Haru had taken the favors from his archery robe and affixed them to his day gown to please the little ones. A pair of sallow-skinned easterners turned up their noses at the din and edged past into the corridor, glancing back at the little princess as she sprang into Haru’s arms and kissed him until he looked like a rose himself.

“Steady on, Ran,” laughed Seijurou, setting her down on the floor again. “We have had a tiring day, and there is still the festival ahead of us.” Both he and Sakura had passed the bouts, and Haru would face them in the jousting matches the following afternoon.

“I could have stayed all day,” cried Sakura, executing a graceful turn as she leapt through the air to stand with Gou. She took the elder girl and waltzed with her along the passage, stopping only once the others were left sneezing in the dust behind them. The dancer’s eyes were alight with mirth, and upon passing her husband again she kissed his pointed nose. Rin cried out a protest as she tapped him smartly on the brow and rushed away, and after hitting Momo over the head for laughing he gathered up his skirts and pursued his wife into the outer hall.

The others followed in twos and threes, Sei with Gou and Nagisa with Rei, while Momo and Malka sprinted past their elders with the children and left Haru and Makoto behind them with Milad.

“Your archery was a vision, Haru,” said Makoto sincerely, accepting his friend’s hand as they made their way through the palace to their own chambers in the royal wing. “How did you learn to shoot so?”

“I would have said it was my cousin—and indeed, his shooting is finer by far than mine—but yet it is not so,” said the Iwatobian, looking pensively down at his slippers. “It was as if the bow had a life of its own, and chose to heed my words for my sake. Aki often said that weapons know our hearts, and that if they are pure we shall know no grief by their hands.”

“They would never hurt you, then,” answered the Qasrian, laughing softly at the blush that stole over Haruka’s cheek.

They parted again at the door to Haru’s chamber, where Makoto bid him farewell and vanished into his own. Haru shut the door behind him and sank down to rest against it, cradling Milad in his lap as the weariness of the day stole over him at last. He let his head fall back upon the panel and laid his hand upon his chest, for a steady ache rose and fell within his ribs with every throb of his heart.

“Haru?”

Rei emerged from the bedroom, wafting the fragrance of jasmine and roses before him. Haru permitted the steward to take the child from his arms and hoist him to his feet, feeling the weight of his shoulders as if they were bent by a pair of ghostly chains. He nodded his thanks to Rei and passed on into the washroom, where the younger lad had drawn him a bath and sweetened the water with perfumed oils and petals.

He stripped off his garments and flung them into the basket by the brazier before sinking gladly into the tub, surrounded by the peaceful scents he had loved from childhood. Haru gazed dimly at the golden drops as they rolled down his fingers, recalling how he had run ahead of his brothers to cast himself into the water before them, and sailed his wooden soldiers across the bath in a pail…

For his heart was open again, gentled by the friends he had grown to cherish, but still his dreams were plagued by the memory of Aki dragging him from his little bed and buttoning Rei into a heavy cloak, leading them by the hand toward the stables where Sasabe waited with a pair of drowsy camels to bear them away to Sikandar. The horrors that followed had never ceased to haunt him—and try as he might he could not cast them aside, even as he turned his thought wholly towards mending his homeland so that it learned its glory again.

At once Haru remembered locks of silver hair, eyes that shone like the kindly moon, and the laughter that echoed below them—the laughter that was stilled for ever that spring, and the weathered hands that grasped his own as if they cradled treasure between them. They had not trembled at the last, when they hefted a crossbow and rushed to his aid that night, but the spirit that drove them was slain for his weakness—and since then he had borne the scars of her passing, for it was as much his doing as it was the knave’s who held the sword.

He turned bitter through the years, as if a diamond shell had closed about his soul, hardened so that none could reach him but Aki and Rei. He had given all his heart to his brothers, but for the piece he kept for their parents—and thought himself too cold to love again, fit for nothing more than the burdens of duty. Haru wrapped his arms about himself and sank deeper into the water, resting his brow on his knees as he recalled the river of blood that ran out upon the floor, and Aki hauling him to his feet and covering his mouth lest his cries give them away.

Rei and Aki were blessed by strength he could not hope to match, for while the others sobbed until they lost their breath they did not lose themselves, and neither did they hide away in terror for the better part of a year, as Haru had done. He wondered why the recollections had returned to him, when by will and grief he had locked them away, safely removed from his waking thoughts even as he lived them anew in the arms of a troubled slumber.

“ _Shin’ainaru-ko?_ ”

It was the Iwatobian speech that startled him awake again, and after washing the soap from his back he rose from the tub and went out into the bedchamber. Rei was there with an ironing-pot, pressing the folds of the robe he had chosen for Haru to wear to the festival. The prince eyed it with disinterest, vanishing behind the wooden screen to put on his undergown before perching by the carved bedposts to watch his friend at work. The creases vanished at the weight of the iron, and though the steward felt Haru’s eyes upon him he did not stir until the gown was fit to be worn.

Rei turned and put the robes into his master’s arms, frowning as he caught sight of Haru’s eyes. They were dark and tender at once, as if the prince were newly wounded, and though the look was fleeting it was plain as day to the younger lad.

“What is troubling you?”

Haru threw back his head and fixed his gaze upon the vaulted ceiling.

“It is nothing,” he said at last, nodding to Rei in thanks and retreating behind the screen to dress. He emerged a moment later in a trailing robe as white as freshly fallen snow, stitched from collar to cuffs with seed-pearls like stars gathered from the cloak of a summer evening. As he went to sit before the mirror, Rei dug through the cupboard for the gift the emperor sent for the betrothal night three months previously, a silver headdress set with indigo blossoms carved from heavy diamond. Haru said nothing as it was put on over his brow, accepting the matching necklace and armbands without so much as a word.

It frightened Rei unspeakably, to see him so—dull and quiet as he had been for the better part of twenty years, until coming to Qasr altered him wholly. He knew at once that Haru’s melancholy was beyond him, and after making his excuses the steward picked up his skirts and fled into the adjoining chamber, where Makoto stood in his parlor with the children, exclaiming over the jewels on their wrists and ankles. He looked up as Rei shut the door behind him, and at the worry on the Iwatobian’s face Makoto gently brushed the twins away and went softly into the next apartment.

*          *          *

“Haru-chan?”

Haru put his head out into the sitting room, looking up and down the chamber for Rei before his gaze alighted on the Qasrian standing by the sketching table. His heart seemed to rise from his feet until it rested between his lungs again, and though he had never in all his life been cheered so swiftly, he found a smile hovering at the corners of his mouth as Makoto drew him into his arms.

“Are you well, _amarya_?”

“Aye, I am,” Haru replied, astonished beyond measure that the assurance was truth. He laid his head upon Makoto’s shoulder, and the ghosts of his boyhood rose and fled at the touch like shadows driven away by the light of a lonely candle.

“ _Mama_ , up.” The little voice was accompanied by a tug at his robes, and looking down he laughed at the sight of Milad standing on his toes and clutching the folds of his kirtle. Haru bent and swung the child up to his shoulders, kissing him once on either cheek before gritting his teeth as the baby’s fingers entwined themselves in his hair.

“He knows his strength well for his age,” observed Makoto, slipping his hand into Haru’s and following him out into the corridor.

“Too well, indeed,” grumbled Haru, keeping a grin from his lips with difficulty as Milad shrieked with delight at his diamond headdress. Makoto snorted and took the child into his own arms, righting the net of frosty gems over Haru’s brow. Milad pouted for a moment before busying himself with the amber locket on Makoto’s breast, poking at the golden pendant until it sprang open to reveal a miniature of the sultan and queen. The Qasrian did not bother to shut it again, for entranced as he was with the portrait Milad did not make another sound as they took the twins by the hand and went down to the marketplace. Seijurou, Gou, and Rin joined them in the square after their prayers with the three Shiginos, for Nagisa had already gone off to join the dancers with Momo and Sakura to prepare for that evening’s performance.

“What shall we do tonight?” yawned Seijurou, who would have forgone the festival if Gou had permitted it.

Rei, Kisumi, and Miya made off at once toward the sweetmeat vendors and took the children with them, leaving Rin with his sister and brother-in-law. Makoto and Haru ambled through the square with Milad swinging between them, looking right and left in search of something to pass the time.

“Haru, look there!”

Haru turned to his friend and cried out in delight, for Makoto had found a counter lined with flowers in full bloom, lovelier by far than the blossoms that were delivered to their chambers for Rei the previous month. They flew past a group of young women in yellow robes to look at the rosy buds, which the vendors stripped from the plants and sold to the revelers in nosegays tied up with lengths of shining ribbon.

“Which shall we have?” murmured Haru, snatching Milad’s eager hands away from a tub of pink and violet hellebore. “Lilies, perhaps? Rei and Ran are fond of them.”

“Aye, and maiden’s ear for Ren and Hayato,” said the elder prince, calling out to the girl behind the table. They spoke together in rapid Qasrian, and after gathering the finest buds of maiden’s ear from the pots she laid them aside in an urn as the lads went up and down the counter choosing stalks of nightshade and kaffir. Makoto strayed across the booth to the table on the east wall of the tent, leaving Haru to tuck Milad under his arm again and draw a handful of coppers out of his girdle for the vendor.

“And half a bushel of these, _sayidati._ ”

He glanced over his shoulder and found Makoto returning to his side with a tub of lover’s grace, bluer than the skies of Iwatobi on the clearest days of summer. Haru drew in his breath at the sight, for lover’s grace was dearer than jade at that time of year, and though he had brought three gold pieces’ worth in silver to the festival he would never have spent it on the lovely blossoms.

“Makoto!” he cried, bending at the waist to brush a silken petal. “They are hardly enough for the urns in your chamber, and we shall never divide them between the three—”

“I did not take them to waste away in vases, Haru,” chided the Qasrian, setting the tub on his hip and Milad on his shoulders as Haru trailed along in his wake. “Come with me to that alley there—it is shielded from the lamps in the market, and we shall go unseen.”

Haru frowned, glancing back at the gaiety in the square as Makoto led him into the shadows. They halted once the Goddess’s pavilion was out of sight, and under the glow of a dying torch Makoto lowered the bucket of flowers into the dust and motioned Haru to draw nearer to him.

“They are nearly as fair to look upon as your eyes,” he said, tearing an armful of blossoms from their stems and weaving them one by one between the links of filigree in the Iwatobian’s hair. “And you look as if you fell from the heavens, _amarya—_ I thought that perhaps a touch of the earth would suit you.”

“Keep the stalks long, if you can,” sighed Haru, resigning himself to his fate as Makoto adorned him from head to foot in wreaths of lover’s grace. He would look every inch the fool when his friend was through, he thought, and laughed as Milad plucked a flower from his bosom and put it into his mouth.

“Milad!” he cried, snorting as the baby spat the petals out again and poked at his tongue as if it had offended him. “They are beautiful as the day, sweetheart, but you would hardly like to eat them.”

“There, I am finished,” Makoto declared, brushing a fallen pistil from his sleeve before stepping back to observe his handiwork. He rummaged in his girdle and drew out a polished looking-glass for Haru, who took it and gasped at the image that met his gaze upon the mirrored silver. He had feared the effect would be ridiculous—that he would look like a child left alone too long in a garden, but amidst the glittering diamonds the flowers shone like jewels, and brought forth the spell of his cobalt eyes as gold and silk and sapphires had failed to do before them. Haru  laughed and bent closer to the glass, observing the gems glinting between the petals like drops of watered starlight.

“Thank you,” he breathed, putting up a hand to touch one of the blossoms over his ear. Makoto smiled and began a circlet for Milad, whose wonderstruck eyes had not stirred from his father’s face since the first of the flowers was tucked into place over his brow.

Haru took a bundle of lover’s grace from the tub and wove them into a crown for Makoto, who wore nothing upon his head. They suited his robes beautifully, for the Qasrian was clad in velvet the color of winter plums, dark as blackberry wine by his feet and light as the sunset by his shoulders. Milad laid claim to the last of the flowers, lining his pockets with the fragrant petals until Makoto leapt to Haru’s side and took them out again.

Having emptied the bucket of their spoils, they carried it back to the vendor’s stall and went back to the dais where the dancers had gathered for their performance. The younger members of the troupe were leading the piece that evening, and Sakura and Nagisa could hardly be seen behind the row of apprentices. The crowd fell silent and settled onto the cushions as it had done the night before, and as the breath of a lilting hymn rose up from the row where the musicians sat behind a linen screen, the dancers turned their faces to the skies and lifted their hands in prayer before springing to life under the glow of the harvest moon.

It was a pretty piece, calling to mind the movements of deer in the mountains and fish in a pool, light-hearted and fair where the capers of the first night were lovely in their shadow. The dancers were clad in yellow and white, and even in the darkness it seemed as if a cauldron of sunlight had burst from the heavens and poured its bounty upon the stage as their trains circled across the lath. Milad was enchanted by the silvery bells they carried, and beat his little fists together in glee when Malka passed the princes and flung an ivory rose to the twins.

The performance drew to a close amid a storm of applause from the guests, and without missing a moment, the harpists began to play again. Shouts of laughter broke from the assembly as the melody grew in strength, and Haru shrieked for joy and looked left and right for Rei, whom he found lurking in the shadows behind Seijurou and Gou. The manservant groaned at the spark in his master’s eye and put his face in his hands, shaking his head as if to ward his friend away.

“No, a thousand times over,” he declared. “You will best me in less than a minute, and I shall not have it happen before half the folk of the citadel.”

“Oh, Rei!” cried Haru, shaking the steward by the shoulders. “You would not have said a word, if we were at home—come up with me!”

“What do you mean, Haru-chan?” asked Hayato, pulling Milad away from the candles burning by the edge of the dais.

“It is a custom in Iwatobi,” said the prince, tugging at Rei’s arm. “And one you shall honor until you are married, at least.”

“Very well,” grumbled the younger boy, putting his hand in Haru’s and permitting his friend to lead him up to the stage. They stood together for a moment, as if they awaited a signal, and without another word they unfastened their sashes and broke into the Iwatobian _agnaur,_ weaving back and forth until drops of sweat stood out upon their necks. They leapt from one side of the dais to the other as lithely as the performers’ guild themselves, and at last Rei stooped and put his hands upon his knees, his breaths halting and heavy as he mopped his brow with a kerchief.

“I cannot tell why you love it so, when you have never lost to me in all your life,” he muttered. “Who shall you choose now?”

Haru frowned.

“Which of our friends is a match for Aki, do you think?” he asked, looking round at the Qasrians standing among the tasselled cushions.

“It would take two, at least,” said Rei, snickering at the look on the advisor’s face. “Three if one of them is Rin.”

Rin loosed a shriek of rage and capered in indignation, bounding between Sakura and Gou to stand beside the Iwatobians.

“What do you mean by that?” he barked, catching the manservant by the ear. “I shall last longer than _you_ , certainly. Dance the steps for me, Haruka.”

Haru gathered up his skirts and crossed the dais once, drifting across the lath like a vision adorned with satin and pearls. The advisor narrowed his eyes and watched him go, marking every turn until the prince stood before him again—for Haru’s alabaster limbs obeyed his will with a grace beyond the might of men, fluid and fair like a bow of molten silver. The air caught in Makoto’s breast at the sight, and though he knew not wherefore nor why, his own legs grew restless as if they wished to try the dance for themselves.

You'll have to be swifter than that, my beauty," smirked Rin, turning on his heel so he and Haru were nose to nose.  "I shall not beaten so easily as Rei, and I mean for you to be cast from the stage.”

Haru bent and freed his toes from his high-heeled slippers, throwing them over Nagisa's head to Seijurou as he drew the advisor to his side.

“Then follow, if you can.”

The minstrels took up the strain again, quickening their pace so that Makoto's ear could hardly catch the ringing notes as they floated from the strings. Haru fell to one knee before the elder lad and made him a salute in the Iwatobian fashion, sweeping and low with one palm over his breast. Rin turned up his nose before following suit, and once he had risen to his feet again he found himself whirling between the laughing couples on the dais, dancing below the guttering torches as if the gaiety of the evening had sent his companion mad.

“Steady, Haru,” he gasped, inwardly marveling at the Iwatobian’s strength, which had not flagged at all despite the quarter-hour he spent dancing with Rei.

“Nay,” laughed the prince, whisking Rin under his outstretched arm and turning to face him again. “I shall not wait for you, my lord—carefully, now!”

The advisor looked over his shoulder and flung himself to the side away from Momo and Malka, who were promenading across the stage with Kisumi and Miya behind them. Haru’s lips turned up in a wicked smile, and after a stealthy nod to the minstrels below the notes came closer and closer together, until at last Rin freed himself from the prince’s arms and stumbled down to the grass again.

“From whence do you gain your power, you fiend?” he spluttered, mopping his temples with the ends of his linen sash. “You are as thin as a willow-bough—and yet you bested us both.”

“He has trained all his life, as a lad ought to do,” said Seijurou, tossing Gou’s veil over his brother-in-law’s face. “He nearly cuffed me at jousting a fortnight ago, and you have never so much as lifted a weapon. Of course you lost to him.”

“Which of us has the mettle to face Haru-chan now, I wonder?” sang Nagisa, springing onto the advisor’s back and muffling the groan of pain that arose from beneath him.

“Makoto.”

The word hovered upon the breeze like the airs of a cherished lullaby, mild and soft like the breath of spring—and yet it stilled the Qasrians in their tracks, leaving them to wonder at its grace long after Makoto glanced up at his friend and accepted the slender hands that reached out for his own through the darkness. There was no thought of rivalry between them, no more than there could be between heaven and the sea, for where Haru drew to a halt Makoto mirrored his pace, and when the younger prince grew weary at last his companion brought him near to his side until they drifted together past the torches like a pair of slumbering fireflies.

They did not leave the dais until the great fire by the pavilion was extinguished an hour later, and as before they took Milad from the General’s arms and vanished into the night with the twins, leaving the others in the square behind them. A pair of puzzled looks passed between Seijurou and Rin, for it was plain as day that the princes were somehow altered—though neither could hope to fathom what had changed them.

*          *          *

“I shall not go down at all today, if we can’t see Haru-chan before the matches!”

“Nor I!”

“ _Please_ , onii-chan!”

Makoto sighed and looked down at Milad, who was attempting to eat his small fists as he sat in his bath. Hayato and the twins were perched upon Haru’s bed, clamoring over one another as the prince took a flannel to Milad’s knees and scrubbed them until they were pink. The baby narrowed his eyes at the cloth, but said nothing—for though Haru was as devout a father as a child could wish for, he was hardly more than a child himself, and Milad had learned long ago to bear his faults with patience.

“Why is it that your dignity is better than theirs, _radhiy?_ ” demanded Makoto, washing the dust from Milad’s hair. His only reply was a consoling pat on the arm, and at the touch he turned and fixed the children with a beady stare. They grew quiet at once, casting down their eyes in remorse as he ran a soapy hand over his brow.

“I shall take you to Haru’s tent, but you shall not enter unless he calls you within,” he said, laughing as Ran and Ren set their rosy lips in a pair of identical pouts. “After all, you were in Mother’s charge last year, not mine—and she would have scolded until she was hoarse if you demanded to see a champion before he unmasked himself.”

“Will he show us his armor, do you think?” asked Hayato, bounding up onto the mattress and launching himself to the floor again. “So we might know him when his matches come?”

“Perhaps,” answered Makoto. “But by law of the tournament he ought not to do it, and you know it as well as I.”

“Haru-chan would not deny us anything, no matter what we asked of him,” said Ran, and shot a wicked glance at Milad.

“It is harsh of you to use him so,” came the reply, and when her brother turned to face them they saw that his brows were drawn up in a thunderous frown. “He loves you dearly, Ran, and you must not forget it—and treat him gently in return, for I have never known a kinder heart than his in all my life.”

“I love Haru-chan thrice as much as he loves me, I’m sure,” said the little girl, laughing at Hayato and Ren as they halted in their wrestling match and tumbled to the floor.

“Aye, it is easy to say so when he spends half his days minding you three, and does all he can to please you.” Makoto chuckled, recalling the image of Haru sitting by the hearth in the parlor and brushing the snarls from his sister’s hair. “I will take you down once Milad and I are dressed, then. Where is Gou?”

“With Sei in his pavilion,” said Hayato. “Rei is with Haru-chan in his, and Rin is with Sakura.”

“May we go to see them, too?” begged Ren, plucking at his brother’s sleeve.

“No, and I shall not be swayed,” said Makoto. He bundled Milad out of the brazier and rubbed him dry before taking him into the bedroom to dress him. “Wait for me in my sitting room—I will be through in a moment.”

Once the five were ready to depart, the crown prince set Milad on his shoulders and hurried the children away to the first level. They met Momo and Nagisa at the foot of the stairs and made their way to the open-air arena, where the jousting matches were to take place. It was fully thrice as large as the archery pit and the indoor practice ring, and so wide across that the torches burning on the east side of the stands looked no bigger than candles from the west. From where they stood by the iron gate, Makoto heard the whinnies of horses from the line of painted tents, and a pair of squires shrieking themselves into fits as as one of the stallions slipped his bonds and dashed away over the grass.

“They will not find it easy to catch him,” Hayato observed, giggling into his sash as the unfortunate boys took to their heels and tore off through the gardens after their quarry.

“No, they will not,” sighed Makoto. “But one of the grooms will fetch him back again. Shall we go to Haru now?”

He found himself nearly deafened at the chorus of shouts that fell upon his ears, and after shaking his head for a moment to clear it, he took the twins by the hand and led them around the perimeter of the field to the row where the champions’ tents stood in a line of emerald, violet, and gold. Makoto narrowed his eyes and laughed when he caught sight of the one that had been his own since his coming-of-age three years previously—a garish affair of yellow and red, painted in dizzying bands of color so fierce that his head swam at the sight of them.

“I did not know he had taken mine,” he laughed, snorting as Milad clapped his hands over his eyes. “Wherever did he find it? It looks as terrible as it ever did.”

“Nay, it could never be so, for Haru-chan is inside,” cried Ran, tugging at his elbow. “Hurry, onii-chan! The opening ceremony is in less than a quarter-hour, and we must go back to find a bench before then.”

“Nagisa and Momo will look after that,” promised Makoto, tramping on through the grass. “Come along, you three.”

They gathered up their gowns to keep them out of the dew and followed him to Haru’s pavilion, nearly treading on Makoto’s slippers in their eagerness to reach the Iwatobian. The twins stopped by the entrance and called within for Rei, who appeared half a minute later with the prince’s helm in his arms.

“Makoto!” he called, ushering the children past into the tent. “We were waiting all morning for you, and at last we thought you would not come at all.”

“Never,” swore the Qasrian, allowing the velvet curtains to fall shut behind him. The pavilion was just as he remembered—large enough only for a chair, pallet, and looking glass, which rested by the northern wall. Haru stood in the center of the room, clad in the fluid armor used for jousting throughout the seven kingdoms. It shone like mirrored silver, unadorned but for the crimson wreath emblazoned across the breastplate: the insignia Haru had chosen for the event, by which he would be called for his bouts when his sigils were drawn from the urn.

“Haru-chan, how lovely!” shouted Ran, running to his side and flinging her arms round his shoulders. He stumbled at the weight, for the armor was heavy, and if not for Rei’s steadying hand at his back he would have fallen to the ground.

“Carefully, Ran,” sighed Makoto, stretching out an arm and hoisting Haru back to his feet. “How do you fare, _amarya?_ ”

Rei’s mouth fell open at the word, and he turned around to stare at the elder prince as Haruka beamed and accepted Makoto’s kiss upon his brow with a grin. A blush crossed the Qasrian’s face at the steward’s confusion, and Hayato’s eyes grew wide as the Haru brought Makoto’s hand to his cheek before letting it go again.

“Hale enough to win for your sake, my friend,” promised Haru, holding his arms out from his shoulders as Rei affixed the narrow breastplate to the brevors. “Have you brought favors for me, then?” he asked, and turned to face the children where they stood by the glass. The little ones cried out in glee as Makoto took their gift from his sachet—a long tail of ribbons in pink, green, and yellow, plaited together like a maiden’s hair and tied off with a length of string at the ends.

Haru exclaimed with delight at the present and passed it to Rei, who knotted it into the back of his master’s faulds.

“It would look well with the rose you wore yesterday,” said the young man, withdrawing to the drapes to observe the effect. “But I fear the pin would tear the silk, and it would surely break if you were to fall.”

“If I am to be stricken from the ranks, it will not be today,” answered Haru, lifting his helm from the dressing table to clean a smudge of oil from the nosepiece.

“ _Haza saeida_ , Haru-chan!” shouted Ren, perching upon the chair to kiss the prince’s cheek. “You’ll run the others into the dust, and be crowned victor day after tomorrow!”

“What of Sakura and Sei?” asked Makoto. “They have no favors from you this tournament, I see.”

It was at that moment that the great horn in the arena sounded with a blast that shook the tent from flag to pole. Milad squeaked and buried his face in Makoto’s neck before bursting into tears, and in the tumult that followed Haru could scarcely calm him again by the time the hour struck three minutes later. The children wished the Iwatobian luck once more for good measure and dragged the crown prince away to the stands where Nagisa waited with Momo and Kisumi.

Gou and Rin were there as well, for as neither had trained to fill the place of squire their champions had no further need of them in the pavilions. The young scholar sat beside Kisumi’s wife, giggling over a tale that the elder girl was whispering into her ears.

“We have been wed for six months, and still she laughs at my expense as if I were a lad of fifteen,” protested the long-suffering bridegroom, kissing the back of Miya’s hand as she shot him a wicked glance over Gou’s shoulder.

“It cannot be helped that you fool about as if you were six years younger,” said Rin. Makoto edged past his advisor to sit by Nagisa, who lay across Momo’s knees with his feet resting upon the railing below.

“Did you visit Haru in the fields?” asked Gou, taking Ran into her lap to brush the dust from her braids. “The three of you made favors for him, did you not?”

“Aye, and he put them on before our very eyes,” sang Hayato. “He shall be magnificent to-day—I am sure of it.”

“Will Rei come up to join us once the matches begin?” inquired Momo. “Rin and Gou returned nearly half an hour ago.”

“Nay, for he is to assist Haru between the matches,” said Makoto. “He is my champion, as Sei is Gou’s, but Rei is his squire, and he must remain where he is needed until the last bout.”

“It is a pity, that,” groaned Nagisa. “I thought we might watch the jousting together, but he shall be in the pavilion until evening.”

“Cheer up, Nagisa,” said Momo, pushing the elder dancer off his legs. “There is the feast two nights from now, and you can trouble your betrothed as you like.”

Nagisa heaved a sigh and looked down into the field. Rei and Haru were to depart before the month was out, and though the young Qasrian was eager to wed his intended he was loath to part from his friends for the better part of the next year.

“The horn is set to go off in a minute,” said Hayato, tugging at Makoto’s elbow. “Shall I cover Milad’s ears?”

The crown prince nodded his assent and permitted Milad to crawl into Hayato’s lap, where the little lad clapped his hands over the baby’s ears until the great conch rang out again from the upper wings. Once the horn had faded away, the champions’ procession streamed in through the southern gate, accompanied by the squires and attendants who would remain with their masters until later in the day.

The men were clad in silver armor, each as like to the next as one hand to another but for the insignias embossed over their hearts. They led their horses by the reins, bays and roans and stallions redder than Sakura’s hair, adorned to the teeth with ribbons in their manes and tassels on their bridles. Rin put his fingers between his teeth and whistled when Haru passed below them with his mare, whose saddle was embroidered with gold and crimson thread.

“Thank Heaven Rei had the wits to leave off his spectacles and draw a veil over his hair,” remarked the advisor, watching as the prince lifted a slender arm to catch a sprig of dried crocuses thrown by a pair of young girls standing close to the balustrade.

“His eyes are clear as day,” sighed Nagisa, smiling down at his beloved with his heart in his eyes. The steward turned to look back at the row where they sat and lifted a hand in greeting before rushing away after Haru, clutching at his silken shawl as he went.

“The veil did little to hide them, certainly,” Gou observed. She sprang up from her place and pointed to the eastern wing, where a group of elderly councilmen had drawn the first pair of seals from the urn. “Look, Ran! It is the broad-shouldered knight from Orhasova—and who is the other?”

“I cannot tell!” shrieked the little girl, waving her flags back and forth so swiftly that one of the banners tore free from its stake and floated away through the crowd. “The fine-looking lad with the mole on his brow, I think—but perhaps it is his brother, the foot soldier!”

The men looked at one another and burst into laughter, joining in as the ladies continued to guess at the poor fellow’s identity. A pair of champions appeared at the doorway and rode off to opposite ends of the field, raising their lances to the sun before bringing them down again and spurring their horses onward to meet in the center of the arena.

And with that, the matches began.

*          *          *

“My lord, your master has been summoned for the next bout.”

Haru looked away from his hands as Rei dismissed the sentry and returned to his side.

“Are you ready, Haru?”

The prince nodded and slipped the helm over his head, narrowing his eyes through the grate at the crimson spire that shone above the curve of beaten metal at his brow.

“Come, then.”

They slipped out of the tent and proceeded toward the gate, Rei leading the little white mare behind him. As they reached the heavy bars, Haru peered past the door to see a pair of soldiers shaking hands by the sultan’s row before parting again. The shorter of the two darted away with a spring in his step, while the other unmasked himself and bowed before the gathering with the dignity of one who had lost his place to a worthy opponent.

Haru took Nafisa’s halter from Rei and bid his friend farewell, drawing in a breath as the gate swung open before him. He set his foot into the stirrup and vaulted onto Nafisa’s back, allowing her to carry him into the field by the western wall. The second champion rode in from the east, and parted as they were by nearly a hundred yards Haru could see nothing but the violet plume atop his rounded helm, worn in the fashion of the northern provinces.

A slender cannon was fired from the upper level of the stands, and after allowing the other man a moment to steady himself in the saddle, the Iwatobian hefted his lance and clucked his tongue at the mare. She put back her ears and galloped at full speed towards the scarlet line drawn at the centerfield, where the lances met with the cry of steel on steel. The blow was fiercer than Haru had expected, and upon passing the other man the prince tightened his grip on the reins and shifted the spear to his right hand, rounding the end of the bar between them to face his opponent a second time. For a moment he thought that Nafisa quivered beneath him as if at a sudden wind, but putting the matter from his mind he rode on until he met the man to his right once more, knocking his weapon into the dust with a single stroke as he cantered forth to the side on which he began the match.

A deafening storm of applause rose from the stands, and Haru bowed once in either direction before sliding to the ground and leaving Nafisa with a young attendant who scurried out of the wings to take her bridle. The taller champion dismounted with equal grace, meeting the prince at the centerfield.

They joined hands and bowed once again to the sultan and queen, and Haru withdrew amidst the cheers of the crowd, leaving the other man to take off his helm and accept an armful of favors from the guests nearest him. Upon passing the row where Makoto sat with the others, Haru glanced up to the balustrade to see his friend leaning over the rail with a knot of lover’s grace dangling from his fingertips. The prince felt the color rise in his cheeks at the warmth in the Qasrian’s eyes, and he came to a halt below the gallery to catch the blossoms as they fell from Makoto’s grasp.

Haru did not call out his thanks, for his voice would have given him away—but when he reached the gate he paused for a moment on the threshold, looking back at the stands until Rei appeared in the doorway and ushered him away to the pavilion.

*          *          *

“He did marvelously!” cried Makoto, shaking Rin by the shoulders until the advisor grew dizzy and slumped back to lie on Kisumi’s arm. “Besting the Haifan on the second pass, no less—and without so much as unhorsing him!”

“It would take a crueler heart than Haru’s to unhorse an man when disarming him would be twice as easy,” objected Gou. “Armor is better suited for combat than a fall—and champions have been gravely hurt in the past while jousting, have they not?”

Makoto nodded, for he had witnessed such a thing the previous winter. The poor champion had been unseated by his opponent’s lance, and sprained his ankle in the fall—but worse was the horse stumbling over its master’s body and nearly crushing him to death beneath it. The soldier had taken the better part of three months to walk again, and at last he departed the army for fear the injury would cripple him in battle.

“Our ribbons looked lovely, didn’t they?” asked Ren, who was humming a lullaby to Milad. The baby had fallen asleep long ago, and since then the Qasrians had passed him from arm to arm so that they might all have a chance to hold him. Momo and Rin came nearly to blows when Momo held the child for five minutes longer than had been agreed upon, and Nagisa and Gou had been forced to sit on the advisor until he regained his composure well enough to take Milad into his lap.

“They did,” promised his sister. She held Hayato by the ends of his sash, for he frisked as if he would fly—and if not for Ran’s restraining hand he would have toppled over the balustrade and straight into the field below. Kisumi sighed and wrestled his brother away from the railing, plumping him down between Miya and Gou.

“Sit still, _radhiy_ ,” he ordered, ruffling Hayato’s hair. “Or you will go over the edge and pull Ran after you, and then we shall never hear the end of it.”

They did not grow weary watching the bouts as they did the previous day, for even while the champions were ensconced in their armor it was a simple matter to pick Sakura, Sei, and Haru out from the others. Sei was taller and broader by far than the rest, while Rei accompanied his master to the ring—and not even the weight of helm and mail could mask Sakura’s catlike grace.

*          *          *

“How long until the closing ceremony?” groaned Momo at last. It was late in the afternoon, and the young dancer was nearly dozing off where he lay on the floor by his sister-in-law’s feet.

“No more than half an hour, I think,” said Makoto, his face splitting in a cavernous yawn. He loosened the clasps of his gown and steadied the twins’ heads on his shoulder, pulling Ran away from the edge of the bench and closer to his side. All four of the children had fallen asleep long ago, and the prince dearly wished that he too could follow them into slumber.

“Will Sei-chan and Haru-chan be summoned again?” asked Nagisa, kicking his heels at the wall. Lili and Malka rolled their eyes and passed him a bowl of dried apricots, enlivening him so that he pushed himself upright again.

“Either, perhaps, but not both,” said Gou, squinting across the field to the banner that bore the insignias of the champions who would pass to the next day of the tournament. “If that one with the silver crest loses the next match, Haru will go on to hand-to-hand combat, and there will not be time enough for Sei to ride after that.”

“And Sakura finished hers after the third bell,” sighed Kisumi. “They did well, all three of them—and two at least shall be pulled from the ranks tomorrow.”

“No, the day after that,” said Miya. “There is a day of rest in between, thank Heaven.”

“They are drawing the seals again,” cried Rin, treading on Momo’s foot as he he scrambled up to look over the railing. “It is Haru’s—his is the crimson wreath, is it not?”

“Aye, it is,” said Makoto. The heaviness went from his eyes at once, and at Kisumi’s shriek of glee the children awoke and slid to the floor to watch as Haru appeared at the gates again with Rei and Nafisa behind him.

He jumped lithely onto the little mare as he had done thrice before that day, turning into the sandy path as he waited for the blast of the cannon. Up in the gallery, the Qasrians pressed themselves to the balustrade and cheered with all their might, shouting the prince’s name for dear life as he bent over Nafisa’s neck and rode on toward his opponent. The other man struck his lance as they passed, but Haru kept his grip on the weapon, taking it in the opposite hand as he rounded the end of the barrier and cantered onto the second track.

In later years Makoto would recall that hour as if no time had passed at all—but in that instant both he and Haru were blind to Nafisa trembling like a leaf as the Iwatobian shifted in the saddle, and the pained rolling of her eyes as Haru put his weight onto his left knee and leaned forward to ready himself for the blow.

The next moment Makoto sprang up with a cry that seemed to tremble the field, and yet it went unheard—for it was echoed all through the stands, in Gou’s horrified scream and Nagisa’s moan of dismay, in Rin’s bellow of fear as the advisor hurled himself back to the railing to watch as Nafisa flung back her head and threw Haru headlong from the saddle. He struck the iron barrier before falling in a heap to the ground, and even as the cries grew louder in the wings his fingers went to the leather strap clasped about his foot—but to no avail, for Nafisa did not stop, and with all her might she dragged him onward through the dust—thirty yards, forty, fifty—

The man in the opposite track had seen the trouble before Haru fell back to earth, and turning his stallion around he galloped at full speed to the spot where Nafisa approached the sultan’s row, still pulling her master by the ankle behind her. The champion arrived but an instant too late to spare Haru the worst, for as the white mare rounded the end of the barrier a second time the prince was thrown against the bars with such force that he crumpled to the floor between Nafisa’s hooves and did not move again.

Up in the gallery Makoto heard the children’s weeping as if from a great distance, and though his knees were shaking so that he could hardly stand he tore himself away from the others and ran towards the steps leading down to the ring. Rin shot out an arm and pulled him back, and thin though he was Makoto fought the younger man with all the strength in his body, straining against the advisor’s grasp until Malka wrestled him back to the bench.

*          *          *

Haru had not been afraid for an instant when he was thrown from Nafisa’s back, for he had endured more than his share of falls during the years he spent trailing after Aki as the elder prince went about fulfilling his ambition of riding the worst-tempered horses in the palace. It was thus that he knew to free his ankle from the stirrups the moment he hit the track, but as the mare did not slow her pace he could not shake himself loose from the saddle. Once he had tried and failed to cut the strap with the blade on his gauntlets, he loosened his muscles and permitted Nafisa to drag him where she would, for he knew he would not depart the field unscathed—and that if he fought against her, he would not escape with his life.

His sight grew dim for a moment as he collided with the bars, but by and by he found he could stir again, and sat up against the barrier just as the opposing champion leapt from his horse and knelt beside him. Haru’s helm had been knocked away by the fall, and at the sight of his pallid face a shout of terror arose from the stands again.

“Prince Haruka!” cried the soldier, taking Nafisa by the reins and tugging her away. “How do you fare?” It was one of Seijurou’s men, a dark-haired lad by the name of Rayan whom Haru had sparred against while training for the tournament.

Haru struggled upright and put a hand to his chest, wincing at the pain that rushed down from his shoulders at the motion of his ribs. They were not broken, he discovered, but beneath the armor he felt as if his skin had been torn into shreds.

Rayan offered him a hand and helped him up to his feet, throwing an arm about the prince’s waist to keep him from falling. By the grace of heaven his ankle was unhurt, and after a moment he found that he could walk unaided.

“Haru!”

_He had heard the cry once before—eleven years previously in the hour after midnight, mingling with the whoop of a polished crossbow—_

Rei suffered his master’s protests without so much as a word and pulled him from the field to the healers’ pavilion, where he found himself forced back onto a pallet and stripped of his armor just as Makoto burst into the tent with Nagisa, Gou, and the rest behind him.

“Haru-chan,” he gasped, falling to his knees by the cot and taking Haru’s hands in his. “How badly are you hurt?”

“It is nothing, Makoto,” said the prince, lifting his arms so that the medics could remove his mail-shirt and then the inner chemise.

At once a chorus of shouts rose in the tent, for Haruka’s body was dull and mottled with bruises, which were lined with crimson drops like beads of morning dew. Worst was the raw skin of his left side, where he had been flung into the barrier; the power of the blow had driven the rings of his chainmail through the jerkin and into his flesh, leaving rents no wider across than a fingernail all down his ribs and past his waist to the band of his trousers below.

“He has had worse,” sighed Rei, withdrawing from the prince’s bedside as a healer approached with a vial of sweet-smelling ointment. She upturned it over her palm and applied it to Haru’s chest and back where the veins had broken, covering his trunk with bandages once the balm had gone.

“You need not worry about the wounds, Highness,” she said, tugging a fresh tunic over his head. “They will not scar if you let them alone.”

They thanked her and departed, leaving the bloodstained jerkin and chemise behind them. Haru followed at a slower pace, and when the others turned back to look at him he wrung his hands and bowed before the Qasrian guard.

“I am forever in your debt, my Lord,” he declared. “If not for you I would have been trampled under Nafisa’s hooves—I cannot tell what ailed her, but she knew not what she did, and if you had not come to my aid—”

“It is only what any man would have done,” said Rayan, accepting the prince’s thanks with a one-handed salute. “I am glad indeed that I parted you both in time, and that you were not sorely hurt.”

“What of the match?” asked Rei. “I do not think he ought to ride again today, and certainly not with his mare, at least.”

“Nay, the jousting is over,” said Rin. “Makoto’s father called a draw after you had gone, and Haru and Rayan were to be the last from the beginning.”

At length they returned to the palace, and upon entering his apartments Haru rushed through the sitting room to the bedchamber, flinging himself upon the coverlet and falling at once into slumber.

*          *          *

_What is the hour, Aki?_

_A quarter past midnight—get up and dress, Haru. We must be gone before they can find us, and they have passed the gates already—_

_*          *          *_

_O my darling, would she wish to see you grieve so long?_

_I ought to have been slain in her place, my lady._

_*          *          *_

Seijurou led the prince’s mare to the stables in silence, for though Nafisa was one of his gentlest horses she had nearly killed the Iwatobian that day—and Seijurou himself had chosen her for his friend, trusting that she would carry him faithfully until the tournament’s end. Never in all her years had she acted in such a way, and to his astonishment he felt himself betrayed.

“What is the matter with you, Nafisa?” he muttered, pouring a sackful of oats into the trough by her stall. “Always he was kind to you—he never raised a hand in anger, and yet you would have crushed him to death under your feet if not for Rayan.”

He sighed and ran a hand through his fiery hair, staining his brow with sweat as he undid the buckles on Haru’s saddle and carried it away to hang beside the others. The stirrup had nearly torn loose from its strap, and again he recalled the screams that had risen from the ring, and the fear that he would return to find a corpse in the field.

Seijurou trudged back to Nafisa’s side with a currycomb and a pail of water, setting the bucket before her as he set to work brushing the dust from her coat. She grew quiet at the touch of the comb, gazing down at the General as if in remorse, and at the familiar glance he pressed his forehead to her neck and ran his fingers through her tangled mane.

He finished working at her right side and went around to brush her left, heartened by the steady mouthfuls she took from the trough of straw. Perhaps she was weary, he thought—perhaps—

“Oh, you poor beast!” he cried, dropping the comb as he looked at the curve of Nafisa’s back. There on the left side was an angry sore, one that had not been present that morning—but over the course of the afternoon matches the saddle had chafed away at her hide, leaving an ugly wound where the panels met her skin. Seijurou threw the brush into the bin by the keg of oats and ran to the high shelf beside the door, taking down a jar of salve and a fresh cloth. He wet the rag in the water bucket and cleaned the blood from her hair, scarcely keeping himself from sobbing as she shook at his touch.

“There, I am not angry,” he soothed, spreading a layer of balm over the swollen flesh until her muscles grew loose again. “It must have hurt you so, when he shifted his weight to the left. It is no fault of yours, sweetheart.”

Nafisa whickered into his face, seemingly pleased that she had made herself understood. The general stroked her nose and gave her another handful of oats, laughing as she butted her muzzle into his shoulder and snorted at the dust on his tunic.

“Aye, I was a simpleton to judge you so,” he said. “I shall be having words with the stable-lads—they spend all their time at cards, and a horse might die before them without their noticing a thing.”

And with that Seijurou gathered his things and departed, leaving Nafisa to rest.

*          *          *

Haru opened his eyes on the darkness of evening, alone in his bedroom without a soul in sight. From where he lay by the window he saw a candle burning in the parlor, but the cot by the nightstand was empty, as was the place by his right where Makoto slept. His bandages had grown stiff with clotted blood, and struggling to his feet he went into the outer room in search of Rei.

He found the manservant lying on the divan with Milad beside him, staring up at the vaulted ceiling. The steward’s cheeks were damp, as if he had been weeping, and when he heard the prince’s footsteps he sat up and turned to greet his friend.

“Has the pain grown better?”  asked the steward, setting Milad down on the floor to toddle between the chairs.

“Yes, but the scabs have stuck to the bindings,” sighed Haru. “And your eyes are redder than the wounds—what ails you?”

“I was watching from the gate, when you fell from Nafisa’s back,” said Rei. “I thought you had surely been killed when you struck the barrier the second time.”

“But I rose again in less than a minute—do not cry, Rei! You saw the damage for yourself, did you not? Aki broke half the bones in his arm with the stallion Uncle bought for his twenty-first birthday, and it did not grieve you then.”

“I nearly lost you once eleven years ago, and today I nearly lost you again,” whispered the younger lad. “And I could do nothing—neither Aki nor I could save you the night we fled the palace, and today—”

“I thought you had forgotten that night,” said the prince, furrowing his brow at Rei. “You never spoke of it after we journeyed back from Sikandar.”

“Neither did you.” Rei shrugged his shoulders and lay back against the cushions, gazing into the empty hearth as Haru sat down beside him.

“But it did not change you at all.”

“Why do I fret for you so, do you think?” asked the steward. “When it is Aki who puts himself in danger for nothing more than his own amusement, and you followed your father’s orders and minded your mother without a word of protest?”

“I never questioned it,” said Haru, puzzled. “You have always been so—ever since you were given your post as manservant you looked after me, and left Aki to himself unless he asked for your aid.”

“That brute would have run a sword through your heart that day, if not for the Queen…and if not for _me_ you would not have fallen behind, and perhaps they would have missed us entirely.”

“Then you think of it still? All these years you were my strength—”

“Only because you were nearly taken from me,” said Rei quietly. “And strength? I who feared the touch of a sword, to sleep alone in the dark—what strength had I? I could not have mustered a drop of it for myself, and any I had was for your sake alone. Perhaps I would have been altered, as you were, if you had not needed me as you did after we left Iwatobi.”

Again the dull ache made itself known in Haru’s breast, and he flung his arms around the steward as the last of their childhood grief departed their hearts through their tears.

*          *          *

“Have you brought the soap?”

“Aye, and plenty of it. Light the candle—how else am I to find the saddle in the dark?”

“It was a gaudy thing, crimson and gold with a scarlet horn. Quickly, quickly—if that redheaded general comes back again we shall not escape with our lives.”

The two men searched between the stalls, looking here and there until the shorter of the pair found a saddle with the stirrups torn loose and dangling to the ground. They hissed at the sight and took it down from the wall, turning it up so that the pale underside caught the glow of the dancing flame.

“It is a wonder the fall did not kill him,” murmured the elder of the two.

“Wash the caustic from the metal,” breathed his companion. “We have hardly a quarter of an hour— and soap it well, or you shall be burned thrice as badly as the mare was.”

For a while no further sound was heard but that of a cloth passing in and out of a pail of water, and the snuffling breaths of the sleeping horses. At last the saddle was dried and returned to its place, and the men drew on their hoods again and departed as softly as they came.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Follow me on tumblr for updates, and expect the next chapter near the end of January!


	12. Breath Before The Fall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the tournament draws to a close, and the end draws near.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two more beautiful illustrations for this chapter, credits to the lovely alsas <3 Here are the tumblr links, as always!
> 
> [Haru at the tournament+Makoto](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/170367749266/the-princes-gaze-was-the-precious-hue-of-lovers)
> 
> [Haru and Makoto at the champions' ball](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/170367751131/upon-his-breast-the-satin-was-dark-as-a-wound)

The following morning found Haru alone in his chambers, confined to the bed to keep his scabs from tearing. The bleeding had stopped at last, and upon waking he removed all the dressings wrapped about his body save those on his left side where he struck the barrier. 

He glanced down at the green and violet blemishes that adorned his arms, and at once he thought of blackberry wine poured out upon a cloth, turning ivory silk to purple in its course. They had long since ceased to hurt him, and the healer who attended his wounds the previous afternoon had promised he would have no trouble with the final day of the tournament. 

Milad sat beside him, tying his poppet’s hair into knots as he gazed solemnly into his father’s eyes.  The child had grown clever with his mischief, and often he clambered out of his crib and hid under the divan in the parlor while his guardians looked elsewhere. But on that morning he seemed to feel Haru’s melancholy as if it were his own, and nestled close to the prince’s chest as if to offer himself for comfort. 

“Nay, I am not unhappy,” said Haru, taking a silver brush to Milad’s hair. “It is only that I ought to be training for tomorrow with the others, and for these accursed wounds of mine I must remain in bed.”

The baby pointed towards the open door, where an early luncheon lay in state upon the sketching-table. Haru laughed and whisked Milad into his arms, bundling him away to the parlor to break their fast. They dined upon bread and meat and sugared fruits, which had traveled to the citadel with the Suhrian envoy earlier that week. Haru was halfway through the laborious task of extracting a cherry stone from Milad’s mouth when a soft knock sounded at the door—neither the familiar echo of Makoto’s knuckles nor the angered thumping of Rin’s fists, and after prising the seed out of Milad’s cheek the harried father rushed away from the table and lifted the latch. One of the palace manservants stood in the corridor beyond, bearing a letter on a silver tray before him. 

“A message for you from Iwatobi, my lord,” said the boy, bowing at the waist before offering the tray to the prince. 

Haru took the letter and retreated into his chambers, shutting the door behind him. The parchment was embossed with golden leaf—the costly vellum which Aki was fondest of, and taking a knife from his plate Haruka slit the envelope and unfolded the sheet of paper within. His cousin’s hand was sharp and bold as ever, the sigils lopsided on the page as if he had written the note in a tearing hurry. 

_ Dear Haru,  _

_ A thousand days in Heaven could not hold a candle to my joy upon receiving your letter in the first week of Aran-mashun, and all of us in Iwatobi are eager for your return. Your mother is half-mad with glee at the thought of having a little one about the place again, and you have talked so much of small Milad that I can scarcely wait to see him myself. Jun and I are nearly finished with the preparations for our wedding, and I have looked at thrice as many gowns and gifts and jewels as I could ever wish to see—but still we are livelier than the winds of spring, and though I am at my duties from dawn until midnight there is no thought of weariness when we shall see you so soon.  _

_ The palace seems as if it is awake at last, waiting for you and Rei to come home just as I have done since you went away. My note should come before the tournament’s end, and if not for the caravan’s delay it would have reached you before it began. I would wish you luck, but I doubt you have need of it—for you match the best of our men in skill, and jousting and fencing with the Qasrians will be easy work for you.  _

_ A parcel for Rei’s wedding ought to follow within three days of my letter, for though he shall be married a second time in our halls I thought he should have something from me before the ceremony in Qasr. Tuck it away where he will not find it—it is addressed to your care, and small enough to hide under the mattress with your letters. He knows where you keep them as well as I do, but there he will not stumble across it by chance.  _

_ I would write you a longer missive, my brother, but you know how dearly I have missed you—and beyond readying ourselves for a royal wedding very little has passed at home in your absence. Your own letters have given me twice the shock I have had in all the years we were together—first you took Milad as your ward, and then Rei’s engagement—and then the Crown Prince falling ill nearly unto death, and my love for weaponry parting him from the world beyond at the last. Our days go on just as they have always done, each as like to the next as one star to another, and when you return you shall see that naught has changed.  _

_ All my love to you both and to Milad,  _

_ Aki.  _

Haru put the letter aside and finished his meal, astonished at the laughter that flowed from his lips as he fed Milad a bowl of porridge and began penning his reply at the writing desk. He felt as if he had woken after a heavy sleep, as if even the burning skies of Iwatobi were dull and dead for the better part of his days—and that between sundown and sunrise the world had come to life, lifting the burdens that his heart had borne since boyhood. He was himself as he had not been for years, and as he glanced up at the gilded mirror above him he knew the deathly shade would not return again. 

At once the door swung back on its hinges a second time, and looking up from his parchment Haru saw Sakura standing on the threshold, clad in her silver mail and practice armor. 

“Still abed at this hour?” she teased, bounding past him to sweep Milad up to her shoulders. “And with hand-to-hand combat tomorrow?”

“The physicians—”

“Never mind the physicians—or Rei, who is likelier to have confined you to your chambers than they,” said the girl, cuffing him round the head with a leather gauntlet. “You were not badly hurt, and you know it. Do you wish to be beaten by one of the younglings in the infantry, or that brute of a man from Marmayah?”

Haru clenched his teeth at the recollection of the Marmayan champion, who had unhorsed one of the riders from Astara so fiercely that the younger man fell senseless into the dust and had to be carried away to the healers’ tent. The poor lad was languishing in the infirmary with a lump the size of an egg on his crown, and but for the Marmayan’s bloodlust he might not have been hurt at all. 

“That is what I thought,” said Sakura. “I shall help you with your bandages, if you fear the scabs will tear, but after that we must go down to the practice ring and spar for a while.”

The prince nodded his assent and hurried away to the bedchamber, where he found a fresh roll of linen in the cupboard and permitted the dancer to bandage him from hip to shoulder again. She clucked over the bruises on his ribs and ordered him to touch the bindings with balm, for though they bled no longer they were nearly as dark as pitch against his pallid skin. Once he was dressed he took Milad by the hand and set off for the first level with Sakura, who slowed her pace for the child and entertained him with a tale she had heard in the performers’ hall earlier that morning. She stopped by the door to the armory and held Haru back before he could enter, passing Milad to one of the little sentries standing guard by the drapes.

“What is it?” he asked, turning to face her. 

“You need not fret for Nafisa,” she sighed. “I know it must have grieved you, that she threw you during the match—but Seijurou brought her to the stables in the evening and found a sore on her back, where you rest your knee before moving to strike. It was pain and nothing more—something the gentlest of beasts might have done.”

Haru laughed and shook his head, for though the mare had worried him greatly it was only for her sake, that perhaps she had been hurt and taken to the jousting field to ride again despite her injury. 

“I am no stranger to a horse’s wrath,” he told her, thinking for a moment Aki tugging him out of his bed and leading him down to the paddocks to ride the wilder stallions. “And I knew it was not anger that moved Nafisa yesterday. I knew she was hurt the instant I fell, and that the fault was mine alone for having neglected her so.”

“Be that as it may, I cannot tell how it happened between your first bout and the last,” muttered Sakura. “I was in the stables when Rei saddled her after the tenth bell, and she was well enough then.”

“Perhaps I had not cleaned the saddle well enough,” said Haru, tucking Milad under his arm and ushering Sakura into the armory before him. “But we need not think of it now—or the Marmayan will best  _ you  _ for your worry, and then Sei will never let you forget it.”

“I would rather lose to Rin than to that buffoon,” swore the dancer, running across to the wall where the practice-blades were mounted by the window. “Now face me in the ring, if you dare!”

“Aye, I dare,” laughed the prince, taking a sword for himself and following her into the arena. 

They spent the remainder of the afternoon sparring until neither could lift their arms for another blow, driven onward by the cheering soldiers in the stands and Milad’s laughter ringing out among the guards. At last Sei flew out of the armory and drove his men away, ordering them back to work before correcting his sister’s stance and vaulting over the half-walls to fence with the remaining champions by turns.

_*_ _*_ _*_

“You will take care, will you not?” asked Makoto, setting his hands upon the prince’s shoulders as Haru drew on a woolen cloak against the morning chill and prepared to depart for the practice ring. Rei had gone down to his master’s pavilion before the elder lad awoke, and only Makoto and Milad remained with the Iwatobian in his chambers. 

“There are no horses to fling me into the dust today, Makoto,” said Haru, taking Milad’s dimpled hands in his own and pretending to eat them as the baby shrieked for joy. “I shall be as safe in the ring as I am in my bedroom, and you need not worry.”

“I cannot help it,” sighed the Qasrian. “If you had been in my place, and I in yours—would you have let me go without a word of caution?”

“Perhaps not, but I am a better swordsman than you are.”

“Aye, a hundred times over, and I shall not deny it,” said Makoto, whisking Milad into his arms and away from the jeweled dagger lying in Haruka’s lap. “What is that for, then?”

“To carry on my girdle for the opening procession,” came the reply. “It is a custom in Iwatobi, to bear a gilded knife opposite the scimitar during the tournaments.”

“Shall you keep it for the matches?” 

“No, certainly not. There would be no use for it, not unless I found myself caught by the stirrups again.”

Makoto winced, for though Haru had escaped nearly unscathed from the jousting match the elder boy could not forget that he might have been killed by the fall, or crushed to death beneath his horse’s feet. The priestess’s warning hung heavy on Makoto’s thoughts, as did the dreams that haunted him night and day since he woke from his fever, and despite the cheer in Haru’s voice his heart did not grow light again. 

“Will you bring the little ones to see me in the tents?”

“Nay, the pavilions are kept under guard for the final day.”

“It is a pity, that,” murmured Haru. “Their ribbons were spoilt when I fell from Nafisa’s back—the plait was cut nearly in two, and now I have nothing of theirs for a favor.”

He turned and set his hand upon the latch, but before he could cross the threshold Makoto called out and stopped him in his tracks with the cry. The Qasrian’s voice had trembled as if he were grieved, Haru thought—and yet his eyes shone as if a pair of candles burned within them, casting pools of golden light across his cheekbones. 

Makoto darted through the connecting door to his own chambers, emerging a minute later with a piece of lapis lazuli mounted on a bed of silver filigree, similar in its pattern and color to Haru’s betrothal ring. It caught the dusty beams from the window as if it had drawn them near, beckoning them down to look upon the glittering veins at its heart. 

“For your sword-belt,” he said, dropping the jewel into Haru’s upturned palm and closing the alabaster fingers around it. “The pin is sturdy enough for leather, I think—but if not—”

“I will wear it,” breathed Haru, tucking it into his bosom. He took the hand that Makoto offered him and brought it swiftly to his lips, kissing it twice before vanishing into the corridor with his mantle rustling behind him. 

* * *

“And here we are again,” sighed Momo. 

They were gathered in the practice ring, pressed together like fish in a barrel on the bench that Kisumi and Miya had claimed earlier that morning. Makoto sat with a twin on either knee and Milad between them, while Rin’s lap was occupied by Hayato and a dinner-basket, which nobody could give to the children to hold for fear it would be emptied by noon if they set their hands upon it. 

Lili and Malka sat with Gou and Miya by the end of the row, poking at Nagisa’s veil with a crooked twig as he knelt on a cushion before them. Nagisa and Momo had elected to sit on the floor and watch between the pillars of the balustrade, for neither of the dancers fancied the thought of having the breath crushed from their lungs by the weight of the older lads. 

“Aye, here we are,” agreed Makoto, steadying Milad in his arms. “But it will all be over by evening, and then we shall have a victor to crown at the ball.”

“Who do you think it will be?” asked Hayato. He wriggled on the advisor’s knee until the basket tumbled down to the tile below, where Nagisa set upon it at once and emerged with a slice of dried-apple tart. 

“Sei, of course,” said Gou—not without cause, for her husband had fully eclipsed the others at jousting and archery, and eager though she was for Seijurou to meet a worthy challenger she could not help but pray he should be crowned the victor again that afternoon, as he had been the previous year. 

“My coin is on Sakura to win,” said Kisumi, who was startled beyond the power of speech when he returned from Sikandar and found a woman with strength to match her brother’s where the long-legged girl had been. “I do not know that anyone but Sei can best her, and surely Prince Haruka is no match for her skill.”

“I would not be too sure of that,” warned Makoto. “He is quicker, though if they face one another Haru will tire before her.”

They chattered amongst themselves until the heavy gong in the entrance hall struck the hour, and at the steady note that rang out through the stands they grew quiet and settled back to the bench to observe the champions’ procession. Only thirty remained of the hundred and fifty that began the tournament three days earlier, and by custom they were dressed for the honor in armor of all colors, glinting under the sunlight like gemstones touched by a hint of fire.

Sei’s was the crimson of an opened vein, while young Rayan of the cavalry was garbed in violet and green with the Qasrian seal emblazoned across his breastplate. Behind him came a knight clad in golden mail, with matching ribbons knotted into the belt by his sheath for a favor. Makoto had but a moment to search among the men for Sakura, for the moment he looked down into the ring he felt the breath plucked from his lungs by the champion passing the box below him. 

He had forgotten to tell the others to watch for the gilded dagger at Haru’s waist—but not even a fool could have looked on the deep-blue armor and thought it fitting to wear for any but Haruka himself. The prince's gaze was the precious hue of lover's grace, mirrored upon the polished helm as if by the power of a looking-glass. His sword was long and bright, the pommel inlaid with silver in the Iwatobian fashion. A chain of golden lilies shone out like a beacon against the steel of the blade, and Makoto was reminded at once of the jewels his friend had worn to the betrothal feast. A pointed shield veiled his face from brow to chin, leaving the cobalt eyes unguarded as tangled lashes swept back and forth across their stormy depths like a pair of inky fans. He glanced up at the stands as he went, and though Makoto knew not wherefore nor how it seemed as if Haru walked with the surety of a king advancing towards his throne. 

The younger prince was somehow altered, as if a great burden had fallen from his shoulders—as if after he was thrown from Nafisa’s back two days earlier he learned a truth so dear that it called his spirit forth to rise from its prison and go where it would. He kept his place in the procession as it rounded the perimeter of the arena, his slender feet rising and falling without stirring so much as a shadow of dust. 

Haru disappeared behind the gates as swiftly as he had come, leaving the Qasrians to marvel in his wake as they watched the last of the champions follow him past the silken drapes and out to the pavilions again. 

“He was beautiful, wasn’t he?” asked Hayato, tugging at the prince’s sleeve. 

“Aye, beautiful as a god fallen to earth from Heaven,” murmured Makoto. “I should have known him anywhere—and yet he was changed, was he not?”

Gou nodded in agreement, looking across to the row where a group of elderly councilmen were choosing the first of the insignias from a two-handled urn painted silver and grey. “He is not the man he was two mornings ago, of that I am certain.” 

Her brother took a spyglass from his girdle and peered at the pair of seals as they were mounted on the board, drawing in a breath through his teeth as the second of the two was pinned in its place. “It is Sei’s—and the first is the Marmayan, I think.”

Nagisa bounded up from his cushion and shook Lili by the shoulders, shrieking in glee until the elder girl tied his arms behind his back with the end of her sash and pushed him down to sit between Malka and Miya instead.

“ _ Lili _ ,” he complained, pulling at his bonds with all his might. “Turn me loose!”

“After the first three bouts are over and done with, and not before,” she said. Malka snorted and burst into laughter, for the head of her guild was wriggling upon the bench like a worm turned out of the soil before her. 

“If Rei-chan were here, he would untie the sash in a moment,” came the declaration. “He is kinder by far than you, Lili—-he would never treat me so!”

“You would never send him out of your wits with your tomfoolery, as you do to us,” sang the unrepentant maiden. “We wish to see the bout without you bouncing from bench to rail like a colt, and if I must bind you hand and foot to keep you still, so be it.”

“Do not be so harsh with him,” said Makoto mildly, permitting the twins to slide off his lap to the cushions before reaching across his advisor’s stomach to undo the knots in Lili’s sash. “Go back to sit with Momo—and remain there, if you have an ounce of mercy for my sake!”

The young dancer nodded and plumped down beside his friend, who gave him a handful of salted peas and turned back to watch Seijurou make his way past the northern gate and advance towards the center of the field. Though the other man was nearly twice as heavy as the General, Seijurou was broader in the back and shoulders, and at the sultan’s signal they faced one another and bowed their heads in a one-handed salute before unsheathing their swords and beginning the match. 

* * *

“Who is it this time?” asked Makoto, who was feeding Milad from a bowl of porridge and mackerel in an effort to quiet his shrieks of joy. His pains had little worth in the end, for the child was gurgling away through a mouthful of fish with all his might. “Milad,  _ radhiy— _ hush for a moment—”

Milad bared his small white teeth and chewed meditatively on his guardian’s finger, for all the world as if it were nothing more than a piece of meat. Makoto winced and wiped the baby’s face, setting the dish aside as he turned to watch the drawing of the seals. 

“Seijurou is first,” called Rei, who had come up from the tents to join them. Haru sent him from the pavilion an hour after the opening ceremony, for he had said that it would be a shame for the steward to forgo the final day of the tournament. 

“And the second?” 

“Haru-chan!” cried Ran, stumbling over Nagisa’s legs and falling flat on Momo’s back. She scrambled up as if a cannon had shot her to her feet again, leaning over the rail until Kisumi muttered an oath and pulled her away to the benches. 

Rei and the Qasrians set up a cheer that nearly drowned the spectators in the stands on either side, crowding close to the balustrade and looking wildly between the northern and eastern gates as they waited for Sei and Haru to emerge. They were dearly beloved, the both of them—and each pair of lips among their friends in the stands shaped first one name and then the other, again and again until thirteen kindly throats were hoarse and rough from shouting. At last they fell silent, settling back to their places as the gates swung back and admitted the champions into the field. 

Haru crossed the threshold first, and to his steward in the wings it seemed as if every step was laughter—light and fair like a breath of rain, sweet and fresh as a summer blossom. Rei’s lips turned up in a grin at the sight, and to his astonishment he found it did not remind of him of Akihiro in Iwatobi—only of Haruka himself, as if the prince’s heart had split from his cousin’s like two berries dangling side by side on a single bough. 

Beside him stood the General, forged with the careless might of a hunting beast—lithe and fierce as a bearded tiger, shaped with the pride of a bird of prey. He stood nearly two hands higher than Haru did, but somehow they were a match for their vigor as the woods were a match for the sighing wind—one young as a shoot and one older than the hills, and both fit to battle with all their power in the ring. 

They turned away from the altar and bowed, first to the gathering and then to the sultan and queen, and lastly to one another as their swords came ringing from the sheaths. Haru paused where he stood and glanced up to the stands before he and Seijurou sprang into motion, striking mail and shield as each made to disarm the other. Haru could not hope to escape his opponent, for where he darted away Seijurou followed his path as if drawn by a lodestone—but when the general lifted his arm for the blow he found that his quarry had slipped past his elbow, forcing the taller man to turn on his heel and pursue the prince again. 

The pair wove back and forth like poppets on a string, each seeming as if he knew the other’s thoughts as soon as they came into being. At last Haru was cornered against the half-walls of the field with the general before him, and up in the wings the Qasrians drew in their breath with a hiss. 

“He is finished now,” muttered Rei, hanging over the balustrade with Nagisa clinging to his sleeve. “Look—”

The steward fell silent as Haru threw himself into the sand and slid between Seijurou’s feet, rising again after he came to halt. The two  _ kaskaras _ met once more with the cry of sharpened steel, and the next moment the heavier blade was torn from its keeper’s grasp and thrown aside like an arrow sped forth from the string. A gasp rang out through the stands, and the shorter champion staggered back as if he had taken a heavy blow—

A wave of shouts thundered upon the ring as Haru’s sword fell to the ground, sliding loose from his startled grip and landing in the dust by the Iwatobian’s feet. He stared down at the weapon and up to meet the General’s eyes, which were wide with astonishment as he imagined his own must be. Haru put out a hand to his friend, and found himself striking a crimson breastplate as Seijurou pulled him into a tight embrace. 

They parted a minute later, and as Haru stooped to clean his blade Seijurou bowed before the sultan and queen and tore his helm away, baring a head of ruddy hair to the cheering crowd. A shower of scarlet blossoms poured down from the stands as the spectators ran to stand by the balustrade, and Sei caught them as best he could before hurling an armful at Haru, who tucked a rosebud into his belt and withdrew after saluting the guests and retrieving the general’s sword. 

* * *

“Don’t fret, onii-chan,” said Momo, patting his brother on the shoulder. “I have never seen a better fight from you in all my life—it was no dishonor, to lose to him.”

“Nay, it was not,” answered Seijurou, rubbing the sweat from his brow with a handkerchief. “He was swifter than a kingfisher, when he knocked the blade from my hand.”

Nearly an hour had passed since Seijurou’s final bout, and after shedding his armor he donned a fresh tunic and came up to join the others in the wings. They welcomed him with shrieks of praise, for he had done well for his station—not one of the champions had stood against him for more than three minutes but Haru himself, and so the prince’s victory had no cause to bring him shame. 

“It shall not be long now,” said Gou, who sat on her husband’s other side with a slice of lamb that Makoto kept back from the dinner-basket. “We shall have a victor within the hour, I think.”

“Perhaps longer, if there is another draw,” sighed Nagisa. The dancer lay across the cushions on the tile with his head on Hayato’s knees, gazing up at the vaulted ceiling as he begged Kisumi for a bite of his sausage now and then. 

“Another two seals,” said Ran, plucking Rin’s spyglass from her pocket as she stared across at the sultan’s row. “Haru-chan again, and—”

A cry broke from her lips, jolting Nagisa out of his stupor as Malka trod on his foot on her way to stand by the princess at the balustrade. Makoto opened his eyes and blinked at his sister in confusion; he had fallen asleep shortly before Seijurou’s return, pressed between Rei and Lili with Ren and Milad snoring on his chest. 

“Who?” he asked, wrapping his cloak round the children’s shoulders. 

Momo’s shrieking was answer enough, and despite himself the slumber lifted from Makoto’s brow and left him cheering with the rest.

* * *

“Your master has been summoned for the next bout,  _ radhiy _ .”

The little lad bounced out of the tent for a moment to receive the news, returning an instant later to find his royal charge polishing his sword by the looking-glass; the dust of the field had worked itself into the gilded flowers on the blade until they grew dark and dim under its earthy shadow. Haru passed a cloth through his bowl of water and cleaned them one by one, nodding to his squire as the child picked up the pointed helm and lowered it over his eyes like a spired crown. 

“Shall you win again, Prince Haru?” he asked, watching the taller boy rise to his feet and heft his shield in hand, testing its weight as the sword plunged back into its carven sheath. 

“Perhaps,” said Haru. He took a piece of lapis lazuli from the dressing table and turned it thrice in hand by the light of the shuttered lantern, pressing it swiftly to his cheek before thrusting the pin into his belt by the scabbard. “Douse the lantern, Lasha.”

“Is that a favor, Highness? From Prince Ren and Princess Ran?” came the answer, followed by the hiss of of the dying lamp as Lasha smothered the flame with his fingers. 

The Iwatobian paused on the threshold of the tent, glancing over his shoulder at the little squire before he found voice for a reply. “Aye, it is,” he said. “Come with me to the gates to watch, if you wish—you ought not to remain here alone, or you shall only find your way into mischief.”

“Very well,” sang Lasha, putting on his cap and darting out of the pavilion in front of his master. They made their way down the path in silence, for the boy knew well enough that Haru did not wish to speak, and Haru himself could not keep from glancing down at Makoto’s brooch as he and Lasha came to a halt by the northern gate. 

“ _ Haza saeida,  _ Haru-chan!”

Haru whirled around to glare at Lasha, who was laughing himself into fits beside him. 

“I never gave you leave to call me so,” he scolded, scarcely keeping a smile from his reluctant mouth. “Sit as still as a mouse until I return, and then I shall give you the sweetmeats from luncheon.”

With that the gates opened before him, and Haru set his shoulders and walked on into the ring, blind and deaf to the shouts of the crowd until he found himself standing before the sultan’s row, where Masoto and Natsuko sat with Lord Shigino and his wife. To his left was the knight clad in golden mail who had been two places ahead of him during the opening procession. The other man stood half a hand higher than Haru did, and the shining ribbons tied to the back of his faulds gleamed as brightly as they had that morning, untouched by the dust of the field. Perhaps he had a fresh pair for every match, Haru thought, and as he bowed he saw that the champion’s sword was a curving scimitar with pointed teeth on the blade, glinting like a burning torch under the beams filtering down from the windows. 

At the signal they drew their weapons and saluted one another again before throwing themselves headlong into battle, each seeking to try his opponent and learn his skill as quickly as he might. The taller man moved like a panther as he circled the Iwatobian, and before long it was plain that the two were as nearly matched as the gathering could hope to see. Where Haru brought up his blade to strike his rival, a polished shield rose like a mace to ward it away—and where the other man took his saber and made to disarm the prince, Haru pulled his sword close to his chest and sprang out of its path as if he had known where it would fall. 

They went on for nearly a quarter of an hour, back and forth across the murmuring sand, one advancing and the other retreating—only for the two to change places in a heartbeat, the hunter becoming the hunted as they fought before the stands. Before long the sweat began to gather at Haru’s neck, and as he narrowed his eyes at his opponent he saw that the long limbs moved as easily as ever, goading him near as he lifted his weapon again. The heavier champion darted forward like a serpent seeking its prey, and when Haru ducked aside he knew too late that the movement was meant to deceive him. He found himself standing in the reach of the scimitar once more, and the next moment its jagged teeth brushed the backs of his knuckles and skimmed his fingers before hooking themselves beneath the guard of his blade and ripping the sword from his hands. 

It flew across the field as if it had been fired from a sling, landing by the table where the councilmen sat with the painted urn that held the champions’ seals. Haru fell back into the dust at the blow that descended upon his shoulders—only fierce enough to knock him to the ground, neither cruel nor harsh as it would have been if he were armed. As he lay on the field a pointed foot came forth and planted itself on his chest, directly over his heart.

The touch was light as a kiss, he thought—the taller man bore his weight on the opposing leg alone, and an instant later the polished greaves withdrew as the champion bent at the waist and offered him an hand up. He rose to his feet and bowed as Seijurou had done earlier in the day, first to the sultan’s row and then to the crowd before turning to salute the man who stood beside him. The prince laughed once, shaking the hand held out to him before removing his spired helmet. 

He expected the favors to rain down from the stands as they did at the end of every bout, but the cheers had not yet ceased—and his opponent was staring through the narrow grate of his helmet at the queen, trembling like a leaf as Natsuko smiled into her veil. 

The shouts from the gathering grew in their strength as a pair of shaking hands rose to the lip of the golden helm, struggling for a moment before they made purchase on the tinted steel. Haru looked on in silence, realization dawning upon him as a mane of claret hair fell free about quivering shoulders, baring eyes as clear as honey and lips the hue of raspberry wine. 

Sakura bent her magnificent head and burst into tears, wrapping her arms around the prince as Rin’s screeches of glee rang out above the din. Haru found that his own throat had thickened, and at the sight of his friends nearly flinging themselves over the balcony for joy he hugged Sakura in return until at last the guests came flooding into the ring. Makoto reached him first, swinging him by the arm with Milad on his shoulders, the child’s sweet voice mingling with his guardian’s like the breath of a cherished song. Rin came next, swooping down on his wife and drawing her into a kiss damp with the salt on their cheeks—and then Rei and Nagisa, who danced around the prince until he grew too dizzy to stand alone. 

By and by the others came to join them—Hayato and the twins, tugging at Haru’s gauntlets until they slid away from his vambraces—Momo and Sei, who sprang at their sister with eyes swollen from weeping. Amidst the tumult Makoto put an arm about Haru’s waist, holding him fast as they departed the field and slipped away to the pavilions. 

* * *

“You were beautiful, Haru-chan,” said Makoto, removing Haru’s breastplate and setting it down on the rug with his helm and greaves. “Not a soul in the stands could look away from you both—not even Momo and Nagisa, and they spent half the matches asleep today.”

“They always do,” grumbled Haru, laughing as Milad put up a hand and grasped his chin. Makoto smiled and freed the younger prince from his hauberk, dropping the mail-shirt over the rest of the armor on the floor. A heavy sigh broke from the Iwatobian’s mouth, and for a moment he let his head fall back against Makoto’s arm and closed his eyes. 

“How do you fare,  _ amarya? _ ”

“Well as I can be, after a day of sparring,” came the reply. “I shall never do this again, not if I live to be ninety.”

“Not in my stead, perhaps,” chuckled Makoto. “But surely you will fight alongside your cousin in Iwatobi next winter?”

“He will have to drag me down to the arena, then,” Haru decided. “I will not go under my own power, at least.”

At last Haru stirred himself enough to mop his face and put on the tunic and trousers he had worn in the morning, following Makoto across the gardens to the palace and up to their quarters in the royal wing. 

They parted at Haru’s door, Makoto vanishing behind his own while Haru took Milad into his arms and let himself into his apartments. The parlor was warm with the afternoon sun, for the drapes had been drawn back to admit the light; Rei had arrived before the prince to heat the water for his bath and lay out his garments for the night ahead. 

“Haru!” cried Rei, putting his head round the door to the bedchamber. “Put Milad in his cot, and I shall feed him his supper—but you must bathe at once, for the ball is at the eighth bell and already it is half-past the fifth.”

“Very well,” said the prince, permitting the child to toddle away to his playthings under the sketching-table. Haru strode past his friend and undressed behind the screen by the cupboard, shrouding himself in a drying cloth before passing into the washroom and clambering into the tub. He sighed in relief as the water closed over his shoulders, for Rei had sweetened it with a generous phial of rose and almond oil. The blemishes down his arms and back seemed to cool themselves at the touch, and the honeyed fragrance that curled about his nose seeped through to his chest and cleared his head like the tonics his father and uncle had poured down his throat after a day of training in Iwatobi. Haru took up the flannel and lathered himself from neck to knees, taking care to rid himself of the dust from the practice ring. There were clods of it smeared between his toes, and as he washed the dirt from his feet he heard Rei calling to him in the chamber beyond.

“What shall you wear?”

“The peacock gown, I think,” said Haru, lifting his voice over the hiss of the steward’s iron. “I had it cleaned and pressed only last week to welcome the delegates to the citadel.”

At last his body was clean and fresh again, and after rubbing himself dry he drew a chemise over his head and went out to the bedroom. Rei sat on the clothes-chest with Milad on his lap, and the peacock robe lay in state across the coverlet with its blue-green undergown hanging beside it. Haru donned them one by one and went to stand before the glass, only to stop in his tracks as a shriek of horror broke from the lad behind him. Haru looked at Rei in question before turning to face his reflection again, searching his bodice for a tear or a stain—

“It is a pity, that,” he said numbly, gazing in disbelief at the neck of his robe. Between the laces his skin shone black and blue like a dish of winter plums, and as he lifted his sleeves he saw that his arms were no better. Worse yet were the paler bruises, for against the emerald silk they had darkened to a sickly shade of green. 

Haru swept back his hair and peered at his shoulders, wincing as Rei put his head in his hands and groaned at the sight. 

“What shall we do?” he asked, turning to his friend. “I look no better than a risen corpse in this. Would the golden robe suffice?”

“Put it on,” sighed Rei. “I dare not hope, for this one suited you best.”

The golden robe proved nearly as ghastly as the first, and as Haru untied his laces he sprang up as if struck by a sudden thought, stumbling over the hem of his gown to the cupboard and pushing half his things to the floor as he rummaged between them. 

“What are you doing?”

A minute later Haru emerged triumphant, clutching a brown-paper parcel under his arm. Rei frowned at the package from where he sat by the nightstand before recalling where he had seen it before, starting up in alarm as his master tore it open and shook out the silken garment folded within.

“You cannot go in  _ that _ ,” he cried, cursing himself for having kept the thing. It had been a gift from Nagisa and Gou for the betrothal night, and after muttering a prayer to Heaven for patience he had thrown it into the cupboard beneath a pile of sleeping-tunics, for never in all his life could he have dreamed that Haru might wish to wear it. The undergown matched the prince’s eyes precisely, shimmering in the lamplight as Haru himself had done when he returned to their chambers after the festival three nights past, adorned from head to foot in wreaths of lover’s grace. It had neither neck nor sleeves—nor so much as a stitch at the shoulders, and as Haru shed his chemise and pulled it on Rei thought wretchedly of what Aki would have said to see him so. 

“Indeed I can,” argued the prince. He strode back to the mirror and whooped at his smiling visage on the glass, and despite his fury the steward sighed and nodded his assent. Unseemly as the garment was, the bruises seemed to fade away beside it, as if after looking on the delicate seams the eye caught nothing strange in the faults of the skin below them. 

“Very well,” said Rei, returning the fallen robes to their place before taking the overgown in hand and lacing Haruka into it. It was a meld of three colors, magenta fading into ivory and then into blue, clasping at the waist with a trailing belt of golden filigree. There was no embroidery on either piece, for the robe would only have been lessened by embellishment. 

As Haru upturned his jewel-case over the quilt there came a knock at the door, and leaving his friend to hunt among the gems for his bracelets Rei went out to the parlor to answer it. Milad bounced out of the bedroom and clutched at the steward’s hand, toddling beside him as he lifted the latch and greeted Makoto in the corridor beyond. 

“Shall I take Milad, Rei?” asked the Qasrian. “Gou and I are readying the twins in their chambers, and it would be a simple matter for Gou to bathe him with Ran in her tub.”

“Aye, if you would,” answered Rei. “It would leave me an hour to wash and dress before supper.”

Makoto nodded and whisked Milad away to the children’s apartment, leaving Rei alone in the sitting room. Haru still sat before the vanity in the bedchamber, nearly nose to nose with the glass as he frowned at the darkness lingering near his eyes. 

“You can do nothing for that,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ ,” called Rei. “Put on your bangles, and then I shall leave you to yourself— _ Haru!  _ Let your eyes alone—there is naught you can do.to mend it now—”

“There is, and I shall,” came the reply. “I have finished with my jewels—all that is left is the paint.”

The manservant lifted his brows and picked his way amongst Milad’s dolls to the inner room, where he found Haru contemplating his tray of powdered gold and a pair of lacquered urns. The vessels had not travelled from Iwatobi with the prince’s things, and after wondering for a moment from whence they had come Rei shook his head and went into his own bedroom. 

* * *

“Rin wept for an hour after he and Sakura returned to their chambers.”

“Nay, it was two.”

“Perhaps he is weeping still.”

“Hush, Momo,” ordered Makoto, weaving a lavender ribbon through Ran’s plaited hair. “And you, Sei—you would have wept yourself into a fever if Gou had been crowned the victor, and you know it.” 

“Perhaps  _ Rin— _ ”

“Hold your tongue,” warned Kisumi, who was standing at Makoto’s right with Miya on his arm. “The Suhrians are three paces away, and the last we need is for them to carry tales of the sultan’s foolish dancers back to their city.”

Momo turned up his nose. “The Suhrians can do as they please,” he snorted. “They are a tiresome lot, and everybody knows it—why ought we to mind what they say?”

“For the sake of your princess, at least,” hissed the General, cuffing his brother round the ears. “It was Father’s diligence that secured her betrothal, and it would be ill indeed for his son to disgrace his name.”

“Where is Haru-chan?” asked Ren, tugging plaintively at Seijurou’s sleeve.

“He and Sakura shall make their entrance after the others have come,” said Momo. 

“Where is your patience, my heart?” murmured Natsuko, brushing a piece of thread from the little prince’s hair. “The ball is in their honor, is it not? It would hardly do for them to receive the guests,  _ radhiy _ .”

“We never saw him at all after he left the ring with onii-chan,” sighed Ran. Her voice was dull and sad, for she and Ren had set their small hearts on returning with him to the pavilion. 

“No matter, sweetheart,” soothed her brother. “They will be along in a minute, and you will see him then.”

The princess fell silent and stared at the curtains that divided the dancing-hall from the passage beyond. The drapes were fine enough to pass through a maiden’s ring, woven of silvery gauze and hemmed with strips of heavy brocade. Behind them the lords and ladies of the court came pouring into the chamber, and as they came the floor of gold and ivory tiles diminished into scarlet and green beneath the trains of their gowns. Among the guests were the delegates from the provinces, clad in the colors of their own cities: pale blue for Haifa, white for Astara, a dusky pink for the Marmayans of the south—

Their conversations mingled together like song, both the quiet syllables of the common speech and the lilting accents of the Qasrian tongue, growing in strength as they echoed from wall to wall like so many children at play. At last the voice of the gong by the door rang out through the clamor, stilling them in their tracks as the shimmering curtains withdrew to reveal a slender figure standing alone in the corridor, glinting like a jewel under the light of the gilded lamps dangling from the vaulted ceiling. 

Makoto drew in a breath at the sight, for the friend he knew seemed somehow changed—and as Haru lifted his head and parted the crowd before him, Kisumi gasped and clutched at Seijurou’s arm in shock. The crown prince refrained from following suit by no more than a hairsbreadth, for the vision making its way across the icy floor was new and strange in its loveliness. The Iwatobian was clad from head to foot in silk so light that the rise and fall of his chest was plain as day beneath it, baring the bruises across his arms and back without a thought for the spectacle they made upon his pallid skin. He had neither sleeves nor collar, for the neck of his gown was fastened to a golden torque that clung loosely round his throat like a sleeping adder. The band was set with a piece of topaz, securing the net of beaded chains that held his robe to the shining ornaments on his shoulders. 

Upon his breast the satin was dark as a wound, hovering between cobalt and vermilion before fading into white at his train and then into blue where it gathered by Haruka’s feet, murmuring against the tile as he made his way towards the plinth the front of the room. He turned and caught Makoto’s gaze as he passed, and as the shifting surcoat brushed his wrist the elder prince knew he had never in all his life seen a soul so fair as the one that shone beside him. 

Even battered and bruised Haru was beautiful, beautiful and proud like a mighty beast wounded in battle, and if to look upon the Iwatobian  an instant longer would have taken his powers of sight, still Makoto could not have torn his gaze away. He had not seen the robe before, and if he had he would have thought perhaps that Nagisa put it into Haru's cupboard for a jest—for it was made to draw even the most reluctant eye as a siphon was made to draw water, caressing the lines of his fluid body like a glove caressing a gentle hand. 

And for the first Makoto saw the fiery breath of the West in Haruka's eyes, eyes shadowed in white and violet and blue—and that below the sighing waves there burned a flame which naught could hope to escape unchanged. The dizzying heat of Iwatobi sang in his blood, and where all had been cool and clear in the Qasrian’s heart it shone scarlet and gold like a heavenly pyre.

* * *

Makoto scarcely noticed Sakura’s entrance a moment later—not until Seijurou hit him round the head with Malka’s fan, at least. She was lovelier even than Haru had been, clad in a robe of fiery red that halted at her shoulders and fell like a stream to the golden tiles, pooling on the floor behind her and rustling like a carpet of autumn leaves in her wake. Her neck was bare, for a set of magnificent rubies dangled from her ears and skimmed the laces of her gown below. A pair of vambraces sparkled at her forearms, vambraces hammered from silver filigree with plates welded loosely together and set with red carnelians at their hearts. Chains of silvery bells were strung between them, filling the chamber with their music as she sauntered up the aisle and took her place on the high step to Haruka’s left. 

As the crowd grew still again, the sultan and the queen made their way to stand before the champions, Masoto bearing a golden circlet set with a crimson stone and Natsuko carrying a wreath of pale jasmine. The two victors knelt at their feet and bowed their heads to receive their favors, scarlet and gold settling upon claret hair as Haru accepted the crown of sweet-smelling blossoms with a fleeting smile. 

“These two have done well for the kingdom of Atar Qasr, as have all of you who dared to try your luck against one another this festival,” said Natsuko, bowing gaily to the gathering and nodding to the champions, who stood clustered before the dais. “I would have you make merry as you will tonight, for from the highest general to the youngest squire you distinguished yourselves with honor.”

With that the candles in the gallery blazed to life, and the minstrels kneeling on the dais took up their instruments and set their needles to the strings, drawing haunting melodies from bow and harp and lyre as shouts and laughter rang out among the guests. One by one the ladies raised their skirts above their ankles and ran lightly across the tile to stand on the right side of the chamber, while the men filed off to the left and linked arms before flinging themselves headlong into the thundering beat of the weathered drums. The singers in the chorus lifted up their voices a moment later, joining the pulse of the pounding rhythm as if their throats had been forged for its waxing and waning alone. Haru found himself swept up between Rin and Kisumi, who pranced across the aisle to take their wives by the hand and spin them about the glimmering floor, replacing them in the ladies’ row as Miya and Sakura tore their dancing-ribbons out of their sachets and waltzed away to join the men. Masoto followed the lads step for step, meeting the Queen half-way and whirling twice on his heel before coming to rest beside Gou and Ran. 

Ren hardly waited for his father to come to a halt, bounding past the queen with Hayato to dance with Ran by turns, Hayato at her left and Ren at her right. As each pair met and parted the lines became a meld of lords and ladies both, and at last Makoto departed his place and crossed paths with Lili before stopping across from Haru, stretching out an arm draped in silver brocade in the prince’s direction. 

The Iwatobian bowed and took Makoto’s hand for no longer than an instant—and yet it seemed that the touch was fiercer than fire, as if a ruddy coal had slipped from the Qasrian’s fingers to Haruka’s own in a heartbeat and blazed a trail of embers in its wake. He drew in a breath as Makoto pulled him near, for the gentle eyes were somehow changed—having kept their tenderness, and gained a depth that had never been present within them before. Haru glanced up and saw himself reflected in a sea of green, shimmering like a fallen star before Momo snatched at the hem of his train and yanked him away. 

By and by the gathering lost all semblance of order, for as the melody grew in strength the rows fell away until all the gathering danced together, townsfolk mingling with the guests from the provinces as a pair of councilmen entered the hall with two pails of colored  _ alkara  _ powder apiece. Rei plunged his fists into the buckets as they passed, emerging with a handful of vermilion and another of yellow, the latter of which he flung over Momo and Sei. Nagisa received the vermilion full on his back, while clouds of it settled like dust onto Haru’s shoulder. Rin shrieked with glee and picked up a double handful of  _ alkara  _ tinted with azurite, tossing it at Sakura as she met him with a shower of poison green. 

Haru hardly realized what passed after that, for before he had shaken the powder from his hair the chamber descended into tumult as the air turned to scarlet and and pink at the flight of the colored dust. From where he stood by a side-door he saw Lili and Malka covered in  _ alkara  _ bluer than the shades of twilight, and the children pelting the sultan with crimson and orange until he looked like a cloud pulled from the heavens at dawn. 

“Are we to go to supper like this, then?” he muttered, shaking out the color from his train and wrapping it round his shoulders as he sidled away to hide in an alcove. He was not the first to seek its shelter, he found—for Makoto had pressed himself into the shadows to brush the clods of powder from his robe, looking at the overgown in despair where the hems had dragged in the dust. 

“Ah, Haru,” said the Qasrian, looking up as the younger prince swept round the corner. “I ought not to have worn this kirtle tonight—it will take an hour or more to clean it, and I shall be up half the night with a dusting-brush, at least.”

“Oh, leave it,” laughed Haru, accepting Makoto’s hand as his friend drew him near to sit on the bench beside him. “It is only a robe, and  _ alkara  _ does not stain.” He lay back against the painted stone and watched the merry-making spill out from the dancing chamber and into the corridor beyond, leaving the room half-empty as the steadier guests of the assembly made for the banquet hall across the passage. 

“Shall we go in to supper, then?” asked Makoto, having cleaned the worst of the paint from his silver sleeves. Haru nodded and took his arm, baring his teeth at Rin before the advisor could dare to throw a fistful of color at him. The elder prince undid the clasp of his heavy overgown and offered his friend shelter beneath it, shielding him from the flying powder until they reached the safety of the corridor. At length the rest of the youths came to join them, until at last the dancing chamber was locked at Momo’s heels and left for the servants to tidy. 

* * *

“What is the festival like in Iwatobi, Highness?” asked one of the smaller champions, who sat between a pair of delegates near the south end of the table. It was the lad who had been so harshly unhorsed by the Marmayan while jousting; save for a bandage round his head, he seemed right as rain and ready to take to the ring again. 

“We have not the flowers that you do in Qasr,” said Haru, taking a forkful of lamb. “And the gaiety lasts for a week and more, out beneath the stars in the desert with none but the snakes and the camels to witness our folly.”

“Are your garments the same as ours at home, Haru-chan?” cried Ran. She had had a hurried conference with Ren and Hayato earlier in the day, and together the children determined that their beloved brother not be permitted to speak so much as a word to the sour-faced easterners if they could arrange it. 

“Nay, not quite,” said the prince, frowning at the inquiry. He had given up wearing Aki’s robes about the palace the week before his betrothal ceremony, and since then the little ones had seen him in nothing but the gowns he had worn in Iwatobi, cropped to the calf and adorned with braid at the waist. “Our sashes are half a foot across at least, and our slippers have soles an inch thick to ward off the heat of the sands.”

“You are fetching indeed in the robes of our kingdom, that is sure,” said one of the Astaran matrons, favoring him with a kindly grin. “Has the crown prince been teaching you the ways of our folk?”

“There was little to teach me, good lady,” laughed Haru. “Little but the Qasrian speech, and if Makoto had not spoken it to me as often as he did I should have been no aid at all to help him with his duties.”

“Haru was a keen pupil,  _ sayidati _ ,” said Makoto, his gentle voice seeming somehow at odds with the flaming glow of his cheek, which had not lost their color though the party was over an hour into supper, and the exertions of the ball were long since behind them. “While I was wounded he filled my place at once with my advisor, and bore my burdens gracefully.”

“Then you have taken a seat in court?” asked the elder of the Suhrian champions, leaning forward to stare at the prince over the rim of his bowl. “And you so newly come to the citadel?”

“Hush your impudence, Azuma,” ordered his liege. “He aided His Majesty at his darkest hour, and it is not for you to question him so.” Masuda’s eyes flickered at the younger man, and when he turned back to look at Haru his face was as smooth as cream. “We thank you for it, Highness—our viceroy had doubted the wisdom of your betrothal to the Princess, and that you would find happiness in a land so different from my own—but upon meeting you I knew he was mistaken, and that it would relieve him greatly.”

Haru glanced to his right, where Rei had long since surrendered any pretense of eating. At once he recalled sitting with Rei and Aki in their schoolroom at home with Sasabe, a volume of history lying open before them as they studied the lore of the five kingdoms—

_ Many years past, before our lands sang truce, Atar Qasr was ruled by the folk of Suhar. Their citadel lay close to the border by Ram-Susah, and as both peoples were hot-tempered and quick to ire they fell to warring with one another, until Ram-Susah was nearly destroyed and Qasr was all but spent. It was the army of Sardahan that spared them, barring the passage between the kingdoms without striking a blow to either side—and many of them perished there, slain by Qasrian fire as well as the arrows of Ram-Susah. When at last the men laid down their arms, the populace chose the Sardhian general as their king, and the citadel lay in Suhar no longer. Since then their capital city has faced the sands, as does ours—for threat ought to come from the desert, and not from within.  _

He dimly heard Azuma speaking with Hayato, who was chattering away about Haru’s virtues as if they had no end. The little lad sang his praises without a thought of flattery, and as he heard Ren chime in he shook himself out of his daze and smiled fondly at the little ones. 

“He loves mackerel best, and baths,” said Ren, snickering into his goblet as he remembered how Haru had frightened Makoto nearly to death on the morning of his arrival. “He always spends in hour in the bath after breakfast, and it is often more than Lord Rei can do to fetch him out again.”

Azuma threw back his head and laughed—a pleasant enough laugh, thought Haru, though it seemed somehow as if a note of unkindness lingered behind it. He paid the Suhrians no further mind as the meal drew to an end, taking Makoto’s arm and bidding the sultan and queen farewell as Gou and Rei took the children by the hand and followed them up to the royal wing. 

The young scholar drove her charges into their chambers and went to ready them for sleep, while Haru rushed on into his own room to relieve Azar, who had consented to remain with Milad until the end of the feast. She kissed the sleeping baby upon his forehead and departed after bidding the princes good night, slipping away down the stairs to her own quarters on the first level. Rei cast off his heavy overgown in the parlor and flung it over the back of the best armchair before throwing himself down on the divan and drawing a quilt over his face. Hardly a minute passed before he began to snore, leaving Haru and Makoto alone with Milad in the bedchamber. 

“Unlace the overgown for me, if you would,” sighed Haru, wiping a smudge of  _ alkara  _ from his nose. He turned his back to his friend and shut his eyes, wincing as Makoto’s knuckles brushed the worst of the bruises at his neck. One by one the eyelets drew apart, baring the turquoise robe beneath and the pattern of blemishes above it. Makoto drew in a breath at the sight, for they had not been nearly as dark when he glimpsed them last—and when Haru shrugged off the cloak and train the Qasrian saw that the movement had hurt him. 

“Have you taken nothing to mend them,  _ amarya? _ ” he asked, turning away as Haru gathered his sleeping garments and vanished behind the screen. 

“A philter that Rei brought from the physicians, but nothing more,” came the reply, shortly followed by Haru himself. He fell onto the coverlet and rolled himself in the blankets beside Milad, falling asleep in an instant as Makoto drew on his tunic and trousers and went to join them. 

As he lay there in the darkness he thought of Haru entering the chamber, careless of the folk who stood about to watch him—all but Makoto himself, he knew, and though he could not fathom why, the knowledge pleased him greatly. A sharp pain blossomed into his breast as he looked at Haru and Milad slumbering beside him, for they would depart the kingdom before the fortnight was out, leaving him for the better part of a year before journeying back to Qasr again. His father had not yet granted leave for him to accompany them to Akihiro’s wedding, for fear he had not fully recovered his strength after the toll of his fever. The prince knew well enough that his brush with the world beyond had troubled the provinces greatly, lest the throne should be passed to one who had not spent her days brought up to it, as Makoto had been. 

It would hardly be fitting for him to spend a month or more away, and yet he desired nothing more than to follow them both to the ends of the earth, if they chose to go so far—leaving hearth and home and duty behind him, if he might remain with the child who had claimed his heart and the friend who lived within it. 

“Forgive me, Haru,” he whispered, brushing away the hair from the Iwatobian’s brow. “I would go with you—but I ought not to do it, for my absence has cost the kingdom dearly, and already there is trouble stirring in the east—”

He started back as the tangled lashes rose up from their beds, unveiling the stormy eyes he had grown to love so well since the summer. Haru blinked once, as if wondering what Makoto had meant—and nodded at the elder prince, taking his sunbrowned hand as he turned his face into the pillows again. 

“We stand for the earth on which our halls were built,” murmured Haru, already drifting back to his dreams as he lay in a pool of scattered moonlight from the diamond pane at the window. “I spilled my blood and sweat for the sake of my people—I gave away my hand for them, and when I was a child my grandmother gave her life. There is no sorrow in it, my heart… it is truth, and nothing more. We are princes before we are men, and often we set our hopes aside to safeguard the lands our fathers cherished before us.”

And with that he was asleep again, lost to the mist as Makoto wrapped a cloak around his shoulders and went out to stand amidst the sighing winds on the balcony. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Follow me on tumblr for updates, and expect chapter 13 near the middle of February!


	13. Slain By Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a prince realizes the truth of his heart, and the hammer descends at last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here's this chapter's gorgeous illustration, and alsas's first rendition of Rei and Nagisa!
> 
> [Rei and Nagisa](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/170972298631/at-last-rei-fell-silent-staring-into-the-dying)

_ “How long has it been, since he stirred?” _

_ “He has not moved at all since the council this morning.” _

_ Makoto blinked and found himself gazing down upon his upturned palms. They were darker than he recalled, as if he had spent a day in the suns of the desert without his gauntlets, he thought. He frowned at the third finger of his left hand, for there was a golden band upon it—and his signet belonged on the right by his thumb, where it had rested since his coming-of-age three years previously.  _

_ He glanced at the sparkling ring again and furrowed his brow, for though he could not recall where he had seen it before it was no stranger to him, set with a glinting emerald he had surely known in the past. As he lifted his hand his trailing sleeves murmured against the table, and he narrowed his eyes at the sight of them. They were dyed black with pitch and ochre, as the custom was in the East to honor a death, and when he raised his knuckles to his chest he brushed a knot of hemlock leaves pinned to his bosom by the neck of his robes.  _

_ At once the fear came coursing through his veins, for he was not in his own chambers but in Haru’s, and Haru himself was absent—the door to the bedroom was ajar, the covers drawn smoothly over the mattress with a pair of bolsters lying against the carven headboard. Makoto rose to his feet and went to stand by the looking-glass, realizing dimly that the whispering voices in the corridor beyond had fallen silent once more _

_ The face that met him was thin and drawn, with great shadows about his eyes, and his cheeks were sunken as if some sorrow had siphoned their flesh away. His lips were pale and bloodless, and his eyebrows were as light as a hatchling’s feathers, sparse and fine against the skin of his forehead. His neck was bare, without so much as a single chain on his breast, and as he looked down at his shrouded body he felt as if he would scream.  _

_ From the corner of his eye he glimpsed a heap of blankets stirring on the divan, as if some small creature were hidden within. He turned slowly to face it, wondering perhaps if one of the palace cats had crept into the chamber—only to clutch at the chest of drawers to steady himself, for it was no kitten that emerged from the nest of quilts, but a tiny maiden with hair the color of wine and eyes that matched them precisely in hue. It seemed that a hint of gold shone up from the crimson of her lashes, and behind her there came a little lad whose sooty head was known to his father as the sun was known to the stars.  _

_ Milad was older than the child he had seen in his dreams, Makoto thought—two or three years further than six, perhaps, while the girl was younger still. They murmured together just as Ran and Ren had done in their infancy, and for a moment Makoto forgot his terror as Milad took his companion’s arm and ran with her toward the narrow passage that led to the manservant’s room. _

_ But as their laughter faded away into the stillness he looked up at his reflection again, wondering what had been taken from him to grieve him so—and yet he knew what he had lost, the soul that was so nearly plucked from his side that very week at the tournament— _

_ “Haru-chan?” he called, holding his breath as he listened for the reply. There was no answer but for a pair of choking breaths in the outer hall, and as the crushing truth took hold of him he screamed like a man possessed, crying the beloved name until he was hoarse. The door swung back on its hinges, and Rin swept over the threshold with Gou at his heels—and they wept as he wished he could weep, their tears mingling together like rain on his neck as the room grew dark about him.  _

* * *

The morning after the tournament’s end, Rei betook himself to the infirmary to begin his healing apprenticeship, bought with a quarter of the gold that the nobles of the court had gifted him the previous month. He fluttered about the chamber for an hour before departing, until at last Haru promised that he and Milad would not suffer for his absence and sent the steward from the room. 

“And will you remember to keep the dried fruits where Milad cannot reach them?” asked Rei, turning back at the door to stare at his erstwhile charge. “He is terribly fond of them, and if he should choke—”

“Have I not looked after him these last five months, then?” demanded Haru. He stared down at his son and lifted his brows, shaking his head as Milad’s small chin quivered in protest. 

“Nay, not so much as an apricot,” said the father. “Go, Rei.”

Rei fastened his cloak and went with good grace, leaving prince and ward in the parlor behind him as he vanished into the corridor. Makoto was still abed, for Haru had not dared to wake him. He had grown weary again from dancing through the night at the ball, and when he crept back from the balcony an hour before dawn his face was pinched and pale as if he were sickening for a fever. 

Milad yawned and tottered away to his heap of playthings under the table, whereupon he curled up on a cushion with his beloved poppet and babbled away to himself with his dimpled thumb in his mouth. Haru laughed at the sight of him and went into the bedchamber, where Makoto slept on between the tasselled pillows. 

“Makoto,  _ amarya _ ,” he murmured, taking the Qasrian’s hand and frowning at the pallor of his fingers. “It is nearly noon,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ , and you have had nothing since supper.”

The elder prince sighed in his sleep without waking, tugging Haruka’s arm to his chest as if to banish the shade of a dream. Haru sat on the bed beside him and pulled the covers up to his knee, lending his warmth to the frigid palm as he waited for Makoto to stir. 

He had nearly nodded off to slumber himself when a cry rang out through the room, startling him awake as Makoto shot upright, panting as if he had run for a long way from some deadly terror. He turned to Haru with eyes nearly swallowed by the darkness within them, wrapping his arms around his friend before falling back to the cushions again. As they lay below the vaulted ceiling Haru felt a calloused thumb flutter at his wrist, settling near the deep-blue vein in his forearm as Makoto put a hand to his collar and essayed to steady his breathing. 

“What ails you?” asked the Iwatobian, his brows darting together as the faded mouth seemed to whisper under its breath. 

“My dreams have been evil of late,” confessed Makoto. “Since the morning I woke from my fever—night after night I stand by your grave with Milad,  _ rouhiya,  _ and find myself all in black with hemlock pinned to my gown.” He drew the raven head to his shoulder, as if to assure himself that life still beat in the slender body beside him. Haruka’s pulse was light and steady in his breast, and Makoto’s thundered against his ribs so fiercely that the younger prince took the Qasrian’s hands in his and set them upon his heart. 

“They are dreams,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ , and nothing more,” he said. “It is the toll of your wound, I think—it has not left you, for you are weary by noon, and you are not yet strong enough to heft your sword and shield together. Seijurou would have called you back to your training long ago, if he had not seen it for himself, and still your mother and father watch you every moment for fear you might grow ill again.”

“I fear they may be more than dreams,” came the reply. “For I have seen—I have seen Milad as he shall be, five or six years hence, and Ren grown nearly to manhood while Ran no longer wears your betrothal ring.”

“You need not worry,” soothed Haru, and to Makoto it seemed that the gentle voice was laughter, chiding him for his foolishness with all the grace of a prayer. “Come have your luncheon, my heart, and you shall be better at once.”

* * *

They parted after their meal, for the council was to meet in the afternoon and Makoto would be in attendance with Rin. Left alone in the parlor, Haru fastened his gown to Milad’s with a length of ribbon tied to the back of the baby’s frock and went to see the twins, who had been let off from lessons that day; Gou was confined to her bed, for she had been sickly of late, and often too weary to manage the children without Makoto’s aid. 

He found the little ones playing at cards in their chambers, and Hayato quarreling with Ran over the piece the small sentry had drawn. Ren lay on his stomach behind them, singing quietly to himself as he copied one of his brother’s etchings on a sheet of crumpled vellum. 

“Haru-chan!” he cried, rolling upright and running across the room to greet the prince by the door. “Have you come to play with us?”

“Aye, I might as well,” laughed Haru, turning his face away as Hayato crept to his side and freed small Milad from his bonds. “But not with cards, I fear, for I have not the patience for it.”

“No matter,” sang Ran, dusting off her gown and bounding to her feet. “The council begins in a quarter-hour, and we shall be late.”

“Do you and Ren have a seat in the party, then?” asked the Iwatobian, greatly surprised. He had entered the council after his tenth birthday, but the nobility of Qasr did not consider their children wise enough to shoulder the burdens of duty until fifteen at least; Makoto himself had spent only six years with his mother and father at court, and surely the twins were far too young to sit beside him. 

The twins shook their heads, and seemed to converse with one another with their eyes before turning back to Haru.

“We have had an ear to the doings of the council since we were old enough to leave our chambers alone,” said Ran. “Father would not be swayed, when we asked to know what was afoot with the provinces—and onii-chan would not disobey, if Father wished him to keep the knowledge from us.”

“Your mother, then?” wondered Haru. From what he knew of his mother-in-law it seemed likely she would do such a thing, for she went about her business with little thought of who might think it unseemly; after all, she had settled the question of his betrothal and coaxed the provinces to allow it, while having perhaps a greater hand in governing her people than her husband did. 

“There are grates in the council-chambers, to let in the breeze from the kitchen corridor,” said Ren. “From there we can hear all that passes in the room above, and whenever the court is assembled we sit by the opening and listen.”

“It was why I dared say nothing, when Mother told me I was to be married,” sighed Ran, setting her small chin on her knees as she looked up at the open window. “Hayato and I cried ourselves to sleep that night, but we knew it had to be done.”

“You must come with us, Haru-chan,” said Ren, exchanging a worried glance with his sister. “After all, all the delegates have not yet gone, and surely they will speak of the betrothal again.”

Haru sat back on his heels and frowned, for he knew the question of his marriage would surely arise at the gathering. Masoto had asked for his presence at every council save this, and if not for the contrary provinces—

“What of Milad?” he asked, plucking a pair of battered cards out of the baby’s mouth. “If he should give us away—”

“Aunt Azar knows what we are about,” shrugged Hayato. “He shall be safe and sound with her in the kitchens, if she is not cross to-day.”

With that they readied themselves and departed, creeping down to the first level without so much as a murmur as they passed the door to the councilroom. The twins pattered away down the corridor until they stood by the entrance to the courtyard, where an iron grate let out the stale wind from the meeting chambers above. 

“There it is, Haru-chan,” whispered Ran, pushing the elder prince toward the passage that led to the kitchens. “Leave Milad with Aunty, and come back to us here.”

He did as she said, and to his astonishment the kindly cook took the child into her arms without question and hurried him out again. Hayato, Ran, and Ren were clustered around the iron plate, pressing their ears to the slits as Haru knelt down to join them. He muttered an oath the moment the lifted voices echoed into the passage, for they spoke the Qasrian tongue as it was meant to be spoken—so swift that he scarcely knew where one word ended and the next began, and heavily accented so that half the syllables could not be heard at all. 

“I cannot hear a word,” he sighed, permitting Ren to climb into his lap to spare his knees from the icy tile of the floor. “You shall have to tell me what passed, when we return.”

They sat there for an hour or more, the children whispering to each other in worry as Haru drifted off to sleep against the polished walls. The weariness of the tournament had not left him, and the weight of the twins in his arms soothed him as well as the memory of his mother’s lullabies. At last the sound of a hundred chairs or more pushed back at once came down to them in the corridor, waking the slumbering prince where he lay as Ren and Hayato pulled him up to his feet. 

* * *

Makoto returned to the third level two bells before midnight, having spent the hours after luncheon with the council and then with his father in the sultan’s study. He shuddered as he recalled the assembly, for after the pleasantries of the opening speech the easterners had raised their grievances at once; namely, the question of Haru’s closeness to the throne while Makoto lay near death with his fever, and their worry that the prince had been given too great a hand in governing a country not his own. 

The queen said little during the audience, for her eyes were narrow and fierce as her son had never seen them before, and as the folk of Habar rose to state their piece she listened with hands folded by her lips, nodding now and then as if she scarcely heard what they said. It was then that the blow had fallen—and by his own father’s doing, no less—for to quell the eastern delegates he called to his cabinet and asked that they turn all their effort towards finding their crown prince a bride, so that Haru might never come within sight of the kingship again. 

Makoto hardly noticed a word after that, for it seemed as if a mist had descended on the councilroom, blanketing his thoughts in fog as he struggled against their weight like a drowning man in a storm. He could not fathom why they troubled him so, only that naught but his marriage would quell the provinces to the east, and that he could not hope to challenge it if he wished to keep his kingdom from war. The prospect of his wedding put an end to the session at once, and as the delegates got to their feet he forced himself upright and stumbled out of the chamber like a ghost, following his father up to his study as the sultan presented him with a list of maidens of the court who were of age to wed. 

Together they had stricken half the names from the page, for the prince avowed he would not court a woman more than two years younger than himself, and of the twelve that remained three were only newly come to the citadel. At last Masoto permitted his son to depart, having extracted his promise to speak with the maidens by the day of Haru’s leaving feast at the latest. It was thus that Makoto went back to the Iwatobian’s quarters, feeling as if he had been dragged over a bed of coals and eager for the balm of Haruka’s company.

The apartment was silent as a tomb as he entered, for the parlor was shrouded in darkness so thick that the torchlight from the corridor did nothing to lift it. The door to the balcony was shut, and a leaden stillness lay over the chamber as if at the mouth of a crypt. Makoto cast off his overgown and crept into the bedroom, pulling back the embroidered curtains to let in the pale glow of the moon. It was bright and full, shining down to the floor like a shower of rain, and by its silent gleam the Qasrian glimpsed the two whose hands he had sought so desperately throughout the afternoon. 

Haru was fast asleep, curled up on the coverlets with Milad clutched to his breast. Beside him his arm hung limp and heavy, curving down to the tile like an anchor dangling from its chain. Makoto drew on a fresh tunic and laid the bloodless hand on Haru’s chest, kissing it once before stretching himself across the bed at Milad’s right as he too drifted towards a troubled slumber. 

“Makoto?”

It seemed that the kiss had woken him, for amongst the shadows of the canopy Haru struggled upright and stared wildly round the chamber in search of his friend. Makoto opened his eyes and found the Iwatobian’s face an inch from his own, white and anxious as he had never seen it before. 

“Is it true, what they said at the council?” he said, grasping Makoto’s shoulder with fingers that bit like iron. “That the place I was given in the court in your absence has angered the easterners, and that you are to be wed so that Ran may never take the throne?”

“Aye,” said the prince, and to hear his fate from Haru’s lips smote him so deeply that he thought perhaps he would weep at the prospect. “My father has drawn up a list of noblewomen, and before your departure I must speak with one of them at least.”

Haru nodded, the lines about his mouth falling into resignation as he pulled the blankets up to his neck. He glanced at Makoto again, and the tears standing like pearls on the Qasrian’s cheek moved him as little had moved him before, the proof of sorrow in a heart so valiant as the one that beat beside him—a heart that deserved nothing but joy, fairer by far than all the rest he had known from his youth to his manhood. 

“Makoto,  _ amarya, _ ” he whispered, taking the quaking hands in his. “How do you fare, my heart?”

“Poorly, I think,” said Makoto, breathing a laugh that shook like a leaf in the wind. “It is a prince’s duty, to bear his lot with grace—but now that I am to be wed it seems to me that I stand before a great chasm in the earth with a horde of devils at my tail, goading me on to my grave! And my Ran has borne it already, without an ounce of comfort from me! Oh, I ought to be slain—such a heartless brother as I was to her—”

“This was my path, as well,” murmured Haru, brushing his fingers through Makoto’s hair. “It was at a council that my mother told me of my betrothal, and of the maid who would be my wife—and there that I gave away my hand, for the sake of your people and mine.”

“How did you bear it, Haru?” asked the elder prince, swallowing the sob that rose in his throat like bile.  “And you are younger than I—how could you stand to leave your home behind you with naught but a fortnight’s warning?”

“I bore it well enough,” sighed the other. He shut his eyes for a moment, recalling the night of a prayer-feast eleven summers ago, and smoke pouring from the windows in the east wing of the palace—

“And so shall you, in time.”

Makoto choked out a sob, drying his tears on his sleeves as Haru tugged him closer to his side. At last he found himself lying on Haru’s chest, enfolded in a pair of slender arms as Milad poked at his stomach. 

“Haru-chan?” he asked, oddly soothed by the steady pulse of his friend’s heart thrumming beside his ear. 

“Hush,” ordered the Iwatobian, humming low in his throat. “Aki and Mother put me to bed so, when I was a little thing, and never once did I have a cruel dream while they were beside me.”

“As you will,” came the reply, faint and frail like the dying breath of a bird. Haru shook his head and lay back against the cushions, pausing to tuck small Milad under the covers before he spoke again. 

“There is not a maiden alive with the power to enthrall a man as Iwatobi has done to me,” he whispered, watching the rise and fall of the elder prince’s ribs. "Our skies are wide and cloudless and clear, and by night the heavens burn like fire.”

At once it seemed as if he stood in the halls of his own kingdom once more, brother to grace and laughter as they had been of old—taking a golden eagle from its perch and carrying it out to the sands on the coolest of spring afternoons, with Rei’s pale-breasted falcon and Aki’s grey goshawk wheeling above them— 

“For every star of the East a thousand shine in the West, and when we were lads we went out to lie between the dunes and named their shapes until we fell into slumber. Rei studied them, as we grew older...he charted the constellations of his birth to the very hour, and by the year we were fourteen it would have been nothing to him, if he were stranded out on the plains—for he knew the stars well enough to let them lead him home, no matter the season. 

“And the very air is fierce as a flame, for all the heat of the south is borne up to the citadel by morning, and we drink like fish to keep our mouths from cracking at its touch. The winds are harsh and lovely at once, for on the brightest days they carry the warmth away to Sikandar, and betimes they bring sandstorms down from the north in which a hundred men might perish together…”

* * * 

Two mornings after the tournament, Makoto awoke to an empty room. 

Haru was nowhere to be seen, for he had departed the chamber and taken Milad with him. Makoto squinted against the sun and decided he had not risen too late for breakfast, looking drearily at the door to the washroom for a moment before a peal of childish laughter sounded in the corridor, closely followed by Haru’s scolding. The Qasrian drew in a breath of relief before bounding away to the parlor, throwing back the door as Haru swept over the threshold with Milad on his shoulders and a covered tray in his arms. 

“Eat before Rin comes down and murders us all,” ordered his friend, lowering the salver to the table as Milad slid down to the floor. “We were to meet with him at the eighth bell to discuss my departure, and now it is nearly ten—Rei went down to the first level to study with the physicians, so he cannot spare us if Rin takes leave of his senses .”

Makoto snorted at the thought of his advisor—pulling his hair out by handfuls, no doubt—and set out the dishes, two platters for himself and for Haru and a patterned saucer for Milad, who never refused his meals when he was given a flowered plate. There was stewed chicken for Makoto and mackerel for Haru, as well as a bowlful of apricots to soothe the harried advisor if he should arrive before they finished. 

The Iwatobian took a portion of chicken before he touched the fish, feeding Milad from his own dish between mouthfuls. At last he took a portion of mackerel and bolted it down, wrinkling his nose at the taste and following the morsel with a goblet of water. 

“Is there anything the matter with it?” asked Makoto, frowning down at the piece of meat. 

“Aye, bitter gourd in the broth,” sighed Haru, poking gloomily at his soup before downing another spoonful. “But it would not do to waste it, certainly.”

He held a bit before Milad, who lifted his feathery brows and struck the spoon from his father’s hand so fiercely that it flew across the chamber and landed in a heap by the cupboard, mackerel and all. Haru stared at him in shock and burst into laughter, shaking his head as Makoto tucked the bit of fallen mackerel into his kerchief to spare the embroidered rug. They talked of this and that as they cleared their platters, and at last Milad began to yawn and whimper in his chair as he clutched at Haru’s sleeve. 

“I took him from his cot too soon, I think,” said Haru wryly, his face splitting nearly in two with a yawn of his own as he took Milad into his arms and whisked him back to the bedroom. “And I must have my bath—will you see to Rin?”

“Aye, though it is unkind of you to leave me to face him alone,” jested Makoto, turning away to the connecting door that led to his own chambers. “He has already seated himself in my study, or I am much mistaken.”

Haru watched him go and perched by the foot of his mattress, rocking Milad back to slumber with the melody of an Iwatobian lullaby. At length the baby grew quiet and shut his eyes, letting go of his father’s collar as Haru bent to kiss his brow and lowered him into his cot. Having soothed the child to sleep again, the prince drew a bath and stretched himself in the tub without removing his tunic and trousers. The weariness of the tournament had not left him, first from sparring until evening and then from dancing through the night at the champions’ ball. His shoulders ached as if they still bore the armor and shield upon them, and the blessed heat of the water drew away the pain as if by magic. Haru sank to the bottom of the tub and looked up at the ceiling for a while, blinking against the weight of his eyes as sleep stole over his limbs again. 

When his lungs began to burn he blinked and put out a hand to pull himself to the surface, wondering perhaps if he ought to return to slumber, and latch the door to the corridor so that Rin could not hope to wake him—

But his arm did not stir, and try as he might the prince could not bend his body to his will. It seemed as if a pyre had burst into flames in his chest, and though he clawed at the rim of the tub his hands lay heavy and still, as if they had been severed by a sudden blow. Haru cried out with all the force of his breath, yet his tongue collapsed back into his throat as he called, and his jaw did not obey his command, clenching shut like a vice as water poured past his lips and into his mouth. 

It was cool as a spring, for between his frozen fingers he felt its chill to his heart, but coursing past his teeth it seemed hot as a brand within him, tearing bone and flesh and sinew as it drove him on to his doom. The kindness had gone from its touch, for the hand that healed him so long ago was dragging him forth to his death, and not by word or movement could he hope to resist—for help was beyond him, and the shade grew black and fierce as the last of his breath broke free from his body. He would have sobbed, perhaps, if he had the strength for it—but at once he knew that the darkness closing about him was not the darkness of drowning, and from the depths of the silence he heard Milad’s crying as if it came from a great distance. 

His voice was as sharp as a knife, sharper by far than his shrieks of hunger and weariness, both of which Haru had come to know as well as the lines on his palm after coming to Qasr. The cries were the cries of grief that the Iwatobian had heard but once in his life, long ago in the back room of a confectioner’s shop, torn from the lips of a child who had lost his mother only hours before. Haru nearly screamed in agony as he felt the bathwater trickle into his lungs, trapping him where he lay and parting him from his wailing son in the chamber beyond. It scalded his innards like vitriol as it went, until tears poured forth from his eyes at the pain and floated up to the silver film that shone like tempered glass above him. 

_ Makoto _ , he thought, hoping beyond hope that the Qasrian would hear Milad’s weeping from the study.  _ Makoto— _

Even his name had been stolen from him at the last, and as the sunbeams faded away into shadow he found he could no longer recall what had troubled him. 

* * *

“Are we sending an escort with them?”

“Nay, Hiromasa is sending a company of his own,” said Makoto, marking the scroll and setting it aside. “What of the foodstuffs for the caravan?”

“Azar has promised to see to that,” said Rin, following suit. 

They worked together in companionable silence, making a note here and another there, until Rin lifted his head and cocked it in the direction of the parlor. 

“That is Milad, I think,” said the advisor, putting down his pen as Makoto leapt to his feet. “Must you go? We shall have to finish this by noon, and Haru is with him.”

“Aye, I must,” said the prince, pushing his chair aside. “Haru is in the bath, and Milad is alone.”

He bounded away to the connecting door in the sitting room and let himself into Haru’s apartment, making straight for the bedchamber where Milad’s beribboned cot stood by Haruka’s side of the mattress. The child was weeping as if his small heart would break, shaken from sleep by the claws of a wicked nightmare.

Makoto frowned at the sight of him—for the younger prince had propelled himself out of the suds to tend to his son time and again, without an ounce of care to his state of undress—and surely he had heard the baby’s crying from his bathtub. Makoto took Milad into his arms and went to the washroom, knocking softly at the door as he awaited the reply from within. 

“Haru-chan, you need not come out,” he called, wiping the tears from Milad’s face. “I have him,  _ amarya _ —”

He stopped in his tracks and listened again, for there was no answer—as if Haru had been lying under the surface, deaf and blind to the world above him until he chose to emerge again. Yet not even the call of the water could have lured him away from his child, and certainly not for so long as it had been since Rin first heard the wails from the study—

At once Makoto shivered with fear and dropped Milad back into his crib, setting his shoulder to the door and throwing his weight against the lath until it splintered beneath him. He stumbled into the chamber and fell on his knees by the tub, where Haru lay like a floating wraith beneath the mirrored water. The curving jaw was slack as death and his cobalt eyes half-lidded, and below the embroidered tunic his ribs were as still as a tomb. 

The elder prince cried out in anguish, for it was as unlike the morning he had found Haru amongst the roses as the dark from the day—his shoulders yielded to Makoto’s hands like clay to the wheel, and as the Qasrian dragged his friend from the tub he knew that Haru had no hand in what had befallen him. Makoto let him fall to the floor, drawing in a breath before he brought his hands down on the pallid chest, striking Haru across the breastbone until a great stream of water tumbled from his lips. But still he did not wake, and silencing the terror that arose in his heart Makoto drew the Iwatobian’s head to his and blew into his lungs. A minute passed by as Makoto breathed for them both, and yet the stormy eyes did not open—as if the soul behind them had already flown its prison, seeking a new and lovely shape in a fairer realm than theirs. 

And at last he knew why in his dreams Haru never stood beside him—why it was that he and Rei and Milad wore hemlock on their gowns, why the moonstone coronet rested upon the brow of a woman whose voice he had yet to learn—and which he would  _ never  _ care to learn, for robbed of Haru the world could be no better than dust and ashes to him. He loved the lad as he had never loved before—all the treasures of one-and-twenty years were pitiful things beside him, no more than pretty flashes of tinsel against a sea of molten gold, and as he worked to bring Haruka back to life he wept at his foolishness, that he had known nothing of it until then. Had he been given but a moment for thought, he would have cursed the heavens until his dying breath for lending him the knowledge—how cruel it was, that he should have been deaf and blind to the truth of his heart until Haru's silent body lay motionless upon the tile before him. 

As the icy lips hung still beneath his own the fear crept back into his blood, and redoubling his efforts he steadied his breath, laying his ear upon Haru’s tunic to listen at his heart. 

But it did not stir, and crying Rin’s name into the silence Makoto struck Haru’s chest with all his might before the flagging beat returned. It throbbed as if every pulse was agony, and as he listened it grew weaker still, as if another movement would finish it wholly. 

_ Breathe, my darling, _ he begged, taking Haru’s hands in his and pressing them both to his own chest.  _ I cannot live without you any more than I could live without my heart— _ amarya,  _ you must not leave me!  _

Makoto bent and breathed again, and at last his labors were rewarded as a sigh broke from the Iwatobian’s nose. The motion of his ribs was so slight that many a practiced eye would have missed it completely—and as Rin broke into the chamber, Makoto looked up with a plea upon his face, one that the advisor answered at once as he turned and fled down to the first level in search of a healer. 

The Qasrian took his friend into his arms and carried him to the bed in the chamber beyond, loosening the prince’s sodden collar with fumbling hands after setting his precious burden down upon the coverlet. And thus he waited, trembling with fear as the minutes drew by until the door burst open again, and Rin came sprinting across the threshold with Rei and a grey-haired physician at his heels. The healer took her case and tossed the contents out upon the sketching table, and following her direction Rei slipped behind the unconscious prince and brought his fists up twice beneath Haru’s ribs, forcing up another mouthful of water. 

“Makoto?” cried Rin, watching in horror as the steward tipped back the prince’s head and breathed for him as Makoto had done.

“He was beneath the water,” gasped Makoto, half-blinded by his weeping as the physician ordered Rei to withdraw from Haru’s side. “He would not stir, though I called and called—and at last I knew he could not hear—he must have fallen asleep in the bath—”

“Perhaps not,” frowned the healer. “He breathes weakly, though his lungs have been purged from what I can hear.” She had pressed a cone to his pallid skin, listening at his chest. “And his heart beats but faintly, though it is not from having nearly drowned.”

She took a mirror from her robes and raised the prince’s lashes, turning the glass so that a beam of light poured directly into the shadows of his pupil from the open window. Having found what she sought, she let his eyelid fall and turned back to Makoto. 

“Did he take a philter for pain this morning?”

“No, not after the end of the matches,” said the prince, glancing at Rei in confusion. “He was given a draught of herbs for his bruises, but it was weak enough for a babe to drink.”

“Then he has been drugged,” said the healer grimly, motioning the steward to breathe for his master again. “Did you dine from the same platters, Highness?”

“We did,” said Makoto, recalling the stewed chicken they divided between themselves at breakfast, and the mackerel that Milad had pushed away, offended by its bitter taste—

He gasped, pressing his fingers to his mouth as he clutched at the advisor’s arm. “There was a plate of fish, I remember. Milad would not eat of it, and I had no more than a piece of gourd from the broth.”

“And Haru bolted it all, did he?” growled Rin, who looked as if he would like to wring the prince’s neck. 

“Where are the dishes?” asked the physician, biting her lip as she turned back to her charge on the bed. “I must know what was given to him—perhaps an emetic would aid him, if it were given swiftly enough.”

“Gone,” cried Makoto, for a maidservant had taken them away to the kitchens nearly an hour ago. “They shall have been washed and thrown in with the rest, surely—”

His eyes fell upon the handkerchief lying on the sketching-table, and with a sigh of relief he ran out to retrieve it and returned to the bedchamber with the bit of fish lying on his upturned palm. The healer snatched it from his hands and brought it to her nose, nearly dropping it in astonishment as she sprang back to Haruka’s side. 

“A sleeping draught,” she muttered. “And strong enough to take off a limb without a man being any the wiser. This was taken from our halls, I am sure—but what in God’s name did they mean by it?”

Rin’s mouth fell open in shock, for the night of the champion’s ball returned to him as if by a blow to the head, and he shook Makoto by the arm as he realized what had befallen the Iwatobian. 

“Ren and Hayato,” he breathed. “They sat with the Suhrians for nearly a quarter of an hour before we departed the hall—Ren spoke of his baths, and his fondness for mackerel—”

Makoto reeled back in alarm, glancing away to the bed as he took Rin by the hand and ushered him into the outer room. 

“Go by the hearth in my bedchamber, and up to the fourth level to fetch my mother,” he whispered. “Do not set foot into the halls—there were nearly forty Suhrians with the champions, and we cannot know which of them did the deed.”

“Aye,” answered Rin. He vanished through the connecting door and into the prince’s room, leaving Makoto alone in the parlor behind him. 

The Qasrian shook himself and went back into the bedroom, where Rei and the physician had stripped Haru of his clothes between them and rubbed him dry with one of the steward’s cloaks. With Makoto’s aid they dressed him again in a winter tunic and breeches and set a pair of quilts to warm before the fire, for though Haru’s lungs were clear his pulse would not quicken, and his fingernails had darkened to blue as if he were half-frozen. As they waited Makoto slipped into the blankets beside him, cradling the prince to his breast as the tears streamed down his neck and soaked his collar below—for the young man’s lips stirred but now and then for breath, and with each motion of his chest the steward bent forward and watched for the next to follow it. 

_ Spare him, Mother!  _ prayed Makoto, looking across the room to the rosewood shrine that had grown as familiar as his own since the summer. Haru’s altar stood nine hands high—well out of Milad’s reach, with the morning’s incense still smouldering on either side of the ivory Goddess. Her dark eyes were freshly lined with kohl that Haru had made by the candle flame the night before, and though Makoto had seen them so from his childhood it seemed as if the curves of paint swept up like a pair of glinting knives. 

He shuddered and turned away, and the next moment the door was nearly ripped from its hinges as the queen strode into the chamber with her overgown roiling about her like the waves of a raging storm. Her son blinked where he lay with Haru in his arms, for it was as if the Martulian sea had come to life before him—resplendent in all its fury, just as it had been on that summer afternoon so long ago when he and Rin were cast from their schooner and washed away to the shore.

* * *

“He is growing worse,” sighed the healer, mopping the sweat from Haru’s neck with a kerchief.

By and by the others made their way to the chamber, wondering where Rin and the princes had gone. Another physician had come and departed, for there was little to be done for Haru but to wait for him to wake, and as bit by bit the philter loosened its thrall he tossed and turned on the mattress as if he were troubled by the heat. 

Makoto stood close at hand with a cloth and a bowl of water, for the drops stood out on Haru’s skin like dew, and he muttered in his sleep as if dogged by an evil dream. The children were weeping in the parlor, and for once their elders were too stricken to comfort them—not even their brothers had spoken so much as a word of solace, for Makoto would not leave his beloved for a moment, and Kisumi was consoling Gou and Miya in the corridor. 

As the hours crept by Haru’s breathing grew heavier, and Rei and the physician kept careful watch by his side. More than once it stuttered and came to a halt, only to rush to life again in a heartbeat as Makoto lunged forward in fear. From where he sat by the bed, the steward looked back and forth between the sleeping prince and the bit of mackerel still lying below the mirror, his lips moving soundlessly as they had done the night Makoto nearly perished from the fever of his wound. 

“ _ Sayidati _ ,” he began, looking as if his thoughts worried him unspeakably. “The philter in the broth—was it—”

“Ahen, in your tongue,” said Phulan. “And  _ nyshk,  _ in ours—what of it?”

Rei’s face went pale, and he flew back to his master’s side to listen at his heart. Haru stirred uneasily at his touch, and the pale eyelids flickered open and shut as if they had parted themselves from his will. 

“Oh, God,” he croaked, raising Haru’s lashes to look at the whites of his eyes. “Oh, God—anything but that.”

He mouthed the word with trembling lips, and Makoto knew it was one that had troubled him before—for he shook like a leaf where he stood, counting on his fingers before running to the washroom and returning with a pitcher of water. He set the ewer on the nightstand and placed his palm on the prince’s brow, counting his pulse at his temple as he sank down to the floor beside him. Makoto looked back to Haru’s sleeping figure in dread, for beneath his tunic his muscles had begun to quiver as if at a deathly pain. 

At once there came a moan from the bed, and as Rei launched himself to his feet again he saw that his master had struggled upright, staring wildly around the room as if searching for something that had long since passed beyond him. Makoto laughed in relief, feeling as if the air had flooded back into his lungs after hours spent underwater. 

The steward choked out a sob, dashing the tears from his cheeks before sinking down beside Haru, holding him fast as the wind passed back and forth from the prince’s lips until Makoto could scarcely hear the lull between one breath and the next. A chill crept over his skin as Haru fell back in his manservant’s arms, gazing up at the ceiling with eyes akin to the ones Makoto had seen for himself in the heat of battle—staring out from bloodied corpses on the sand until they were shut away behind their spired helms for burial. 

“What is the matter?” cried Makoto, watching in horror as the younger lad chewed at his lip until his teeth were stained with blood. 

“You will see,” gasped Rei, grasping Haru’s hand as if for dear life. “But the little ones ought not to hear him so, and neither should you. My lady—” He turned back to the queen, who lingered by the door with a face as white as salt. “Send them to their own chambers, Majesty! These walls will not be enough to stifle him, and if they should chance to hear him—”

She went without a word of protest, shutting the door behind her as Haru’s eyes flew open again—and the light within them was that of a man half-crazed, dragged back in chains to the brink of some deadly fear and made to witness its grief anew. He did not seem to know them, for his gaze passed over the steward as if he were not there, and he turned back where he lay to glance at the carven headboard. 

At once Rei began to weep, for his master opened his mouth and loosed a gurgling scream—a scream so high in its pitch that the glasses trembled on the nightstand, and for an instant Makoto thought they would shatter where they stood. He caught no words in the cry, but as Haru’s voice grew hoarser it seemed that he was calling out in the Iwatobian speech, uttering a pair of syllables time and again until he fell back to the cushions once more. He darted upright the instant he struck the pillow, and the name that fell from his lips was Aki’s—repeated into the silence until Rin stumbled out of the chamber and took refuge in the parlor with Nagisa, who was sitting by the hearth with his head in his hands.

“ _ Mizu _ ,” croaked Haru, grasping blindly at the air before him. “Rei,  _ mizu— _ ”

Makoto would never forget the hour that followed as long as he lived, for Haru’s tormented cries echoed round and round his head like the thundering of his own heart—begging his friend for water until the jug was empty, and coughing as if he would die of thirst when Rei snatched the goblet away. 

“No more,  _ shin’ainaru-ko— _ you will make yourself ill—”

In all his life Makoto had never known a greater grief than the sight of his heart brought nearly to ruin before him, and as the screams began again he covered his ears and sobbed. 

* * *

By nightfall the storm had passed, for after Haru grew calm enough to take an emetic his stomach was purged of the last of the drug, and scarcely five minutes later he fell fast asleep with Rei by his side. The toll of the day had been worse for the servant than the master, for while Haru’s cheek was damp and cold with sweat, the younger lad looked like a fallen body turned up from the bed of its grave. He shook like a leaf as he climbed to his feet, and at once Makoto knew that prince and steward had borne the hand of the  _ nyshk  _ before, though he could not imagine why, nor how. 

“My lady,” breathed Rei, clutching at Nagisa’s arm to steady himself as he looked up at the queen. “I beg of you—”

The sultan nodded on his wife’s behalf, looking back at the spot where Rin sat slumped on the floor with Sakura and Momo beside him. 

“Rin, my son,” he said. “Send an attendant down to the trading post—there is a caravan leaving for Iwatobi with a hired guard at midnight, and Haru and Rei must go with them.”

Rin saluted his liege and departed at once with his brother-in-law at his heels, running down the corridor until their footsteps died away into the silence. Makoto set his jaw and turned to the manservant, laying a hand on his shoulder as he sagged against the panels of the wardrobe. 

“I will gather his things, and yours,” he said, tugging Rei across the room to the divan that Sakura had dragged in from the parlor. “There is naught we can do now, and you ought to rest yourself until Rin returns.”

“He will not wake for an hour at least,” called Phulan, wiping her brow as she sank into an armchair. Her gown was streaked with water, and her face was pale and drawn from the toil of the afternoon. “Have your sleep while you can, child, for you shall be glad for it soon enough.”

The steward made his way to the cushions and fell asleep in a moment, stretched upon the divan like a corpse laid out for burial with his hands folded across his breast. Makoto threw open the wardrobe and searched among the embroidered gowns for Haru’s travelling clothes, which he found below a stack of sleeping tunics and a pair of gilded sabers. The cotton chemises were clean and freshly pressed, and their comforting scent was one he had come to know as well as his own reflection—the fragrance of almonds and cassia, whose silken traces lingered on the prince’s bedclothes like a song. 

He tucked them away in a linen pack and took the lighter of the two swords in hand, tying the guard to the notches on the scabbard with a length of string to keep the blade from slipping loose. Next came a bundle of desert veils, which Makoto himself had never occasion to wear—for he had never journeyed more than six leagues west of the citadel, and Haru had never donned them at all after coming to Qasr. Their braided bands were folded between them, and after filling the pack with tunics and breeches he went across to the chest of drawers for Milad’s things, which he emptied into a satchel with the doll that Ren had made for the child in the summer. 

After combing the chamber for Haru’s riding slippers, he slung the bags on his shoulder and went softly to the sitting room, where Sakura sat cross-legged on the sketching table with two more packs at her feet. They were larger and heavier than Haru’s, and the name embroidered by the clasps was one Makoto could not recognize; unlike his advisor, he could not read so much as a word of Iwatobian, and the seal on the dusty packs bore four characters to Haruka’s three.  

“Rei’s,” said Sakura, biting her lip as she glanced at the door to the bedroom where Haru and Rei lay sleeping. “Why—why should anyone wish to kill him, Makoto?”

He sighed and shook his head, cursing himself for having left his friend alone after breakfast. It seemed as if a deadly frost lay over his heart, keeping the thing from shattering at the thought of being parted from the one who had claimed it. It was shock alone that sustained him, coupled with the fear that Haru would be slain if he spent another night in the palace, and faced with such terror he found that speeding the prince’s departure was the lightest duty he had undertaken in all his life. 

“It matters not,” he sighed. “I must go to the children now, for they were frightened out of their wits when Mother took them from the room.”

Sakura nodded and watched him go before bounding down to the entrance hall to await her husband’s return, wondering for a moment how a day so fair could be plunged so harshly into shadow. 

* * *

Haru woke an hour later, blinking against the firelight like an owl cast out in the sun. When he rubbed the haze from his eyes he found himself lying beside his steward, who had forsaken the divan to creep between his blankets as he had done in their childhood. Makoto was nowhere to be seen, and for a moment he could not recall where he was, nor the day—for it seemed that he had finished his morning meal not long ago, and yet past the drapes the sky was dark as pitch. He pushed back the coverlets and swung his legs to the floor, staring in confusion at the thick trousers hanging loose to his ankles; they were a fresh pair that Rei had commissioned for the winter from a seamstress in the marketplace, and far too long in the shins for Haru himself. 

Rei’s arm lay heavy on his chest, and he gripped the seams of the prince’s tunic as if to ward off a cruel dream. He frowned at the sight of it, for he had often risen to find the taller boy holding fast to his clothes in their youth—but not for the past six years at least, and though Haru had slipped into his brother’s bed thrice in their first week at the palace, Rei had not sought to sleep in Haru’s for longer than he cared to remember. 

As he pulled himself up to his feet his knees gave way beneath him, and to his astonishment he fell to the ground like a stone, crumpling like a sack on the tile as his knee struck the edge of the wardrobe. A cry sounded from the chair by the fire, and upon glancing up he found that there was a woman in the room—thin and grey-haired with a wrinkled gown, and after a moment he recognized her as the physician who had offered Rei his place with the healers. He had met her once before, the morning he witnessed the signing of the steward’s apprenticeship, but for the life of him he could not fathom why she had come to his chamber. 

“How do you fare, Highness?” she asked, taking him by the wrist and heaving him back to the bed again. “You must take some food as soon as you are able, and rest until the sultan calls for you.”

“The sultan?” wondered Haru, pressing a hand to his temple. His head ached from his brow to the nape of his neck, as if he had downed a tankard of brandy and followed it with mead for good measure—and glancing down at his lap he saw that his breastbone was covered in bruises, large and dark like stains upon satin, seeming almost to bear the shape of a heavy palm and a pair of thumbs.

He loosened his laces and opened his collar, gasping at the spectacle that greeted him below. The healing skin was red and swollen, and the prints of an iron hand were clear as day along his ribs. The wind grew thin in his lungs as he counted them, and as he struggled for air a knifelike pain smote him near his heart, piercing his chest like a blade when he moved. Phulan clucked her tongue and guided his head to the pillow, commanding him to hold still as she ran her fingers down the line of muscle and bone. 

“Cracked,” she muttered. “Breathe once more for me, Haruka.”

Haru did as she said, for he was far too stunned to disobey. He stifled a groan as he drew in a breath deeper than he could bear, and the healer nodded and tugged his tunic down to his waist again. 

“It is only one rib, and the break is a small one,” she said, patting his arm as she rose to her feet. “I would bind it, but it is better left alone—and I cannot give you a philter after the day you have had, my lord.”

He gaped at her, wondering what in the name of Heaven had broken one of his ribs—and whose fingers were stamped on his breast, having left the mark of their strength behind them.

At once the memory returned to him, nearly striking him down where he sat—of rocking Milad to sleep and slipping into the washroom for a bath, of lying at the bottom of the tub as he often did after breakfast—of water pouring into his mouth, choking him like the coils of a serpent as he fought to break the surface, and then—

Haru cried out into the darkness, shaking his snoring manservant from slumber as he began to weep. The younger lad flailed among the blankets and seized Haruka’s wrist, staring wildly around the chamber before he found his master sobbing beside him. 

For a while they could not console him, and Phulan looked on bewildered as she held a goblet of water to his lips. Rei lowered his gaze to the coverlet, for the the question in her eye was clear as day to him—he knew as well as she did that the power of the  _ nyshk  _ ought to have given Haru pleasant dreams, even as the life was drained from his body—

“We depart for home at midnight, Haru,” he said, wiping the tears from his brother’s face. “There was  _ ahen _ in the mackerel you had at breakfast, and the fiend who put it there knew you would shut yourself in the washroom for a bath after the morning meal. We must be gone before dawn, so they shall not have the chance to strike at you again.”

Haru nodded wearily, for he had gathered as much the moment he remembered what had befallen him. He could not remain in the city, he knew, if some knave had his heart set on murdering him—for worse than the cruelest of deaths was war, as would surely come to pass if the folk of Iwatobi heard that their prince had been killed in the house of another king. Not a soul would have known the truth, if he had drowned in his bath that day—but perhaps a sword in the back would follow, and there would be no concealing such a slaughter from the citizens of either country.

“Where is Milad?” he asked. The crib to his left was empty, and he flexed his knuckles as he thought of the hand that ought to have held them—the hand whose might had wrestled him forth from a watery grave, as if the will that governed it had known he was near to his ruin. 

“With Makoto and the little ones,” said Rei, sighing in relief as something of the friend he knew returned to the prince’s eyes. “You would have died without him, Haru—somehow he and Rin heard Milad’s crying from the study, and he purged the water from your chest and forced your heart to life again. It is then that he cracked your rib, I think, for your lungs were full to the brim, and even he could not clear them alone.”

A yelp rang out from the parlor, and as Haru glanced up he saw Makoto stumbling over the threshold, plunging toward the bed until he fell on his knees beside it and took Haru’s hands in his. 

“Oh, Haru-chan,” he sobbed, kissing the slender fingers again and again until the feeling had gone from his lips. “Oh, sweetheart—I thought you were lost to me, my darling—”

Rei’s cheeks grew pink at the sight of them, and calling his excuses to Phulan he rolled out from beneath the quilts and bounded away to the parlor, where pair of soft voices were whispering together by the divan. 

“Not yet, Makoto,” murmured Haru, sinking back to the cushions. He winced again at the pain at his ribs, putting a palm to his chest at the power of it. Makoto looked down in alarm, watching the pale hand curl into a fist as the Iwatobian gritted his teeth. 

“What is the matter with him?” he cried, turning to the physician. “His heart—”

“It is  _ not  _ his heart, Highness,” grumbled Phulan, offering her patient another goblet of water. “You broke his fourth rib when you cleared his lungs, but it could not be helped. He would have perished there, if you had not put all your strength into saving him, and the bone will heal before long.”

“Oh,  _ amarya _ ,” he breathed. “Such a fool as I am, to forget you are frailer than I—”

He looked as if he might weep, and Haru shook his head. 

“Rei tells me we are to leave at midnight.”

“Aye, you are,” sighed Makoto. “Your packs have been taken down to the trading post, and Rin and Momo are choosing a pair of camels for you both. We will send on the last of your things in a week with the next caravan, so you need not fret for that.” 

“Very well,” came the answer, weak and faint as Haru’s lashes settled back against his cheek. Yet he was not asleep, and as Makoto watched the rise and fall of his chest he recalled the torment of the afternoon—the tearing screams that had echoed to the ceiling, and Haru’s fingers clenched and curved like a pair of talons as he clawed at his throat. 

“Haru-chan,” he began, plucking at the prince’s sleeve. “This afternoon—do you recall what hurt you so,  _ rouhiya? _ ”

Haru’s eyes flew open, and at once his face was shuttered and still as if a door had slammed behind it. He looked once more like the youth Makoto first met by the entrance hall two seasons and a half ago, given to temper and silence and melancholy—for the week they knew one another before they returned from the marketplace with Milad beside them, at least. Makoto started back in surprise, for he had nearly forgotten the veil of sadness that once hovered around his friend like a shroud—dark and bitter as a well of oil, shadowed by anguish so fierce that the Qasrian felt as if it had burned him. 

“Haru?”

The younger prince did not turn his head, and for a moment it seemed that he had heard nothing at all. He made his way to the divan and donned a pair of thick-soled slippers, rummaging in the wardrobe for a veil and band before emerging with both in place above his brow. It was still the lad he loved that stood beside him, Makoto thought, but yet it was not so—and as Haruka bowed before the shrine, his friend rose from the bed and made his way to the outer room, nodding to Nagisa and Rei as he vanished behind the door to his own parlor. 

* * *

At the eleventh bell the Iwatobians were dressed and ready to depart, robed and hooded for the desert sands as they stood together in the sitting room. The Qasrians were gathered around them, from the sultan and queen down to Malka and Lili, who heard of the events of the morning from Sakura and came up to the royal wing to bid them farewell. All five of the ladies were weeping into their veils, and the children’s eyes were red and swollen as they buried their faces in Haru’s sash. 

“You will come back again in Subat next year, won’t you, Haru-chan?” asked Hayato, blubbering into his sleeve. “You promised us you would teach us all to fence, and come with us to the northern woods some day—”

“Aye, I shall,” smiled Haru, bending to kiss the top of Hayato’s head. “Wild horses could not drag me away, and Aki shall have to go without me in the summer now that I have you three to return to.”

Ren and Ran had been crying for so long that their voices were nearly smothered, but as they wailed on his shoulders for kisses of their own Haru felt his throat begin to swell as if he were sickening for a fever. He had scarcely known how dearly he loved them all, and now—

“There,  _ radhiy _ ,” murmured the queen, taking their hands and drawing them away. “Let them go, my darlings, for we have little time.”

With that she turned on her heel and led the little ones into Makoto’s chamber, passing the door to the corridor as if it were not there. Haru furrowed his brow and glanced back at Rei, who shook his head and trailed along at Natsuko’s heels. Malka and Lili remained behind with Gou and the three Mikoshibas, while Makoto brought up the rear with Nagisa and Rin. 

“You cannot go through the palace from your own apartments, my son,” she said, standing on her toes as she fumbled with a knob atop the mantelpiece. “You must enter the town unseen, and from my quarters on the floor above there is a servants’ passage that will take you to the courtyard by the kitchens.”

The hearth was wide and large enough for two men to pass through its mouth together, empty; a pair of fresh logs lay on the andirons, but there was not so much as a spot of ash at the base of the chimney, and the stench of soot and smoke that lingered near the fireplace in Haru’s parlor was absent as if Makoto had never burned so much as a twig in his own. 

At once there came a rattling grumble behind the tapestry that hung above the mantel, and the far wall of the hearth sank down into the floor as if it moved on wheels. Rei gasped and stumbled back onto Haru’s foot, staring wildly between the void in the stone and the long-fingered hand on the lever before he took Milad down from his shoulders and followed his master into the darkness.

* * *

An hour later they came to the lower town with Nagisa walking before them, leading them on through the streets in silence until they reached the trading post in the western quarter. The others had remained behind in Natsuko’s chamber, leaving the dancer to take Haru and Rei to the trading post where the men of the caravan sat waiting to depart. 

They were a kindly lot, clad in tunics and veils to guard against the sand and accompanied by a score of hired guardsmen with the seal of Tirah Alis on their mail. Amidst their yarns and laughter the Iwatobians found their camels near the tail end of the herd, fed and watered and rested for the fortnight’s journey ahead. Once the packs were bound to the saddles the party moved off, taking the beasts by their bridles and coaxing them down to the city gates where a line of sentries stood keeping watch on the balustrade. 

One of the soldiers came down to greet them, glancing once at the goods they carried before signaling to the others to raise the portcullis and let the traders out into the night. Nagisa had not yet left his beloved’s side, clinging to the steward’s gown for dear life as Rei strapped Milad to his back and set his foot in the stirrups. Haru was already sitting astride his own camel with his bags tied down to the platform behind him, staring out into the night with eyes as dull as as an effigy’s. 

Rei climbed up to the saddle and fastened a dustcloth over the baby’s face, thanking every power he knew that the child was too stunned to cry—or perhaps that he was too small to realize what had befallen his father, and that he would not see Makoto again until the following summer. Nagisa patted the manservant’s ankle and lifted a hand in farewell, stifling his tears on his shawl as Haru nudged his steed to its feet. All around them the camels were rising up from their knees, and as Rei made to follow he looked back at the lad he had promised to wed, who held his careful heart in his keeping—who had been meant to accompany him a fortnight hence, when they journeyed back as newly-married bridegrooms for Aki’s handfasting—

“Come with me,  _ amarya! _ ” he cried, leaning down until his fingers brushed the dancer’s hair. “Swiftly, my love—I would not leave you behind for the world, and—”

“Oh, Rei-chan,” sobbed Nagisa, taking the proffered hand and scrambling up the slope of hide to sit on the pillion before him.

* * *

The traders made camp seven leagues from the citadel, unrolling their tarpaulins for a floor as they cooked their dinners and unsaddled their camels for sleep. Haru drove the poles into the sand as if he hardly knew what he did, lifting his sleeping son from Rei’s arms the moment the tent was finished and crawling over the blankets to lie against the far wall. He held the baby by his side, for he could not bear the weight on his chest, and before a minute had passed he fell into a heavy slumber with his face turned up to the weathered canvas at the ceiling. Nagisa bounded after him a minute later, drawing the quilts up to his head as Milad took hold of his veil.

Rei remained outside for an hour or more, listening to the suthering of the breeze as he roasted a pocketful of chestnuts on the fire. They were bitter and sweet at once, as Nagisa loved them best, and one by he flung the shells to the coals and watched them sink into ash. 

As he looked up at the stars he heard the mouth of the tent rustling in the wind behind him, followed by the whispering murmur of the sands as Nagisa slipped out of the covers and came softly to the steward’s side. Rei patted the hem of the mantle to his left, sighing above the winds themselves as he recalled the events of the day. The dancer sank down onto the cloak and leaned against Rei’s drooping shoulders, taking the Iwatobian’s hand before glancing up at his beloved in question. 

“Why did Haru act so, Rei-chan?”

The manservant’s breath shuddered in his lungs as he drew the mantle closer to his chest, and he rested his chin on his knees as he stared out into the desert. Over the years the torment had grown pale in its grief, further away with every passing season—but to Haru it was new and fresh and close, for the power of the  _ nyshk  _ had torn away its veil and left him bare to its horror again. Rei himself only faintly remembered that summer, for it was a month or so before his eighth birthday, and eleven winters had passed since then. 

“You know how it was, that Haru and I journeyed to Qasr,” he said. “Our rains came late and ended sooner than they ought to have done, and without the aid of the sultan our people would have starved to death.”

Nagisa nodded and pulled the skirt of the buckskin mantle over the steward’s toes. “Aye, and Haru-chan’s hand was the price for the goods that were sent to Iwatobi.”

“Eleven summers ago, the rains did not come at all,” said Rei. He gazed out between the dunes and then back to the tent where Haru slumbered on, curled against the weathered canvas with Milad by his side. “I do not recall much of that drought, only that if not for the hidden granaries we would have perished in the first month—and that the nearest province to the citadel was worse by far than we were, for they had little kept back to live upon. What food could be spared was sent out to all the Iwatobian strongholds, measured equally—but the wealthy folk of Dhaika resented that we had given so much to the folk of the neighboring city, and thought their worth was such that the Queen should be willing to starve the commonfolk for their sakes.

“But she would not be swayed, and sent them from the palace when they brought their grievances before her.”

“Thank heaven for the Empress Kaguya,” murmured Nagisa. “But surely it was Hiromasa’s place to refuse them, and not hers?”

A shadow stole over the steward’s face, and as he gathered himself again it seemed that a great burden rested on his shoulders, clasped about his neck like a serpent choking the life from its prey. 

“Nay,” he sighed. “Hiromasa had not yet taken the throne. His mother Suhaila was Queen, and it was the thirtieth year of her reign.”

“Haru-chan’s grandmother?” asked the younger lad. He frowned and glanced back at the tent, where the prince’s breathing faltered as if even in his sleep he grieved at the mention of her name. “Did she give up her place when she grew weary, then—as the sultan will, some day? And what of the Dhaikans?”

“They would not accept Suhaila’s word, and for a time she feared they meant to strike the citadel and take what they sought by force. After the first month it seemed that we would endure, that they would cause no trouble…but by the third week of Aran-hazad, rumor drifted back to us that they meant to rebel and seize what was left of the stores for themselves. The soldiers roamed the streets of the town by night, keeping watch, and it seemed that all the palace was waiting—waiting in the silence like the breath before a storm. Our nursemaid, Miho—she kept us to our chambers, and during that month we only caught sight of the sun from the windows. They were locked and barred more often than not, for fear some knave would climb up to the sill from the courtyard, and by night she sat by our beds until dawn with a lantern burning beside her.

“And for eighteen days there was nothing—not so much as a murmur from the south where Dhaika lay, and at last the guards withdrew to their barracks in the evenings. The watch by the gates remained strong, stronger than it had been for many years, but still the Queen was with the council from sunrise to dusk, and the princes rode out to join the soldiers each night after the assembly retired. Neither Haru nor Aki had so much as a glimpse of their fathers for weeks, and all that time we did not see a soul but for Miho and the princesses. Even our tutor Sasabe was called away to arms, and he made his bed in the soldiers’ rooms with the others. 

“One evening the council held a prayer-feast, in hope that the rains would return, and Tamotsu broke open the casks of sacred wine from the previous summer’s festival and shared them out among the guests. That night Miho did not come to us, though we thought little of it—we had our supper at the feast, and we had been watched so closely that season that we took the chance to empty our stores of sweetmeats and listen to Aki’s ballads long after we ought to have been abed, just as we used to do before the trouble began.”

Rei shut his eyes against the darkness, as if to banish a cruel dream, and when he opened them again Nagisa saw that a frightened child peered out through the shadows where the careful man had been. 

“What then, Rei-chan?” Nagisa reached out and took the steward’s hand in his, holding it like a lifeline as Rei cleared his throat and went on with the tale.

“At last we fell into slumber, and we did not wonder that the corridors were so still—not until Aki awoke an hour later and heard screams in the courtyard. He went to the window and saw that the soldiers were fighting with a band of hooded men by the palace doors, and then he lost no time—he woke us both, and I recall that though the torches were dim the gates shone red as the dawn in the moonlight. We knew not what to make of it then, and as soon as we were dressed Aki took us by the hand and led us out through the servants’ passage. 

“There were footsteps flying all about us, and we heard them through the walls—but they were not the steps of the soldiers, for they ran this way and that as if the palace was foreign to them. But we did not meet a soul on our path, and at last we knew what had happened—all the council and half at least of the soldiers had been at the feast that night, and they took draughts of the sacred wine during the prayer. Someone had laced it with a sleeping philter, and as the princes and I were not yet fifteen Miho gave us no more than a swallow apiece. Our tutor was our only hope, we knew—for he had forgone the feast, and Hiromasa and Tamotsu had taken his share of the wine.

“Once we had reached the second level we emerged into the corridor that took us past the Queen’s apartment, and it was there that we met the devils that did the mischief—for the mercenaries from Dhaika had sworn to take the palace by force and seize the goods they sought, and slaughter Suhaila and all the rest of the royal house for good measure. They caught sight of us and gave chase, but we were swifter than they—swifter until I grew weary, at least, and as I began to lag Haru stumbled over the hem of my cloak and fell. He could not rise at once, for he had hurt his ankle, and the next moment the knaves were upon us with their weapons unsheathed, drawing near for the blow.

“Before their leader could strike he was dead on the tiles, and when we looked up we saw the Queen stagger forth from her chambers with a crossbow in hand. She killed a handful of the rogues almost before they had seen her, but the instant they looked her in the eye they knew who she was—for her eyes were the blue of the Nanase clan, and though she could hardly stand her shots rang true like a marksman’s. 

“But she was weak from the power of the draught, and when they left us and turned away to meet her we knew—we knew what she wished to do, and scarcely an instant later she spent the last of her bolts and fell to the ground with a dagger in her chest.”

The tears were pouring thick and fast down the steward’s cheek, flowing unchecked like a river dark with the might of a spring monsoon. Nagisa himself had begun to weep long ago, thinking both of the man he had grown to love and the prince who had become his friend—both of whom had been so nearly taken from him, and as Rei steadied his breath and went on, the dancer unfolded his kerchief and tried in vain to quiet his shaking. 

“Aki pulled us away, and his hands were clasped across our mouths to muffle our cries—we could scarcely breathe, but he dared not let us go for fear we should be found and slain. I cannot recall how we reached the stables, but Aki was sure that Sasabe would await us there, and when we passed the doors we found he had readied a camel for our departure. We could not remain in Iwatobi, we knew, for the men of Dhaika would not suffer a child of the royal house to live—nor me, for I was their companion and as near to the throne as they were.

“By the grace of Heaven we broke through the clamor and passed the palace gates, and it was then we saw why they looked as they did—for the town was aflame, and smoke was pouring from the barracks as the soldiers fought with the Dhaikans in the streets. To this day I do not know how many died, that night...only that their numbers were past the count of sorrow, and as we fled the citadel all we could hear was the roar of the fire mingling with their screams.”

Nagisa choked on his breath and huddled closer to the steward’s side, holding tight to Rei’s trembling arm as if he feared it would vanish from his grasp. 

“Sasabe knew the Dhaikans would follow, if they had so much as a crafty thought between them—so we turned away from the west and set our course to the north-east, for Sikandar.”

The dancer frowned. “But your city lies in the last of the five kingdoms, does it not? And Sikandar is—”

“Eighty-seven leagues off,” said Rei, his lips curling into a bloodless grin. “Eighty-seven leagues, with naught but a kerchief of dried meat and a single skin of water to share between a man and three children. It was the height of summer, and I was frailer than a lad of my age ought to have been...and by sundown on the first day, I could no longer stand alone, and I hardly knew the others when they came to wake me.”

“Oh, Rei-chan.”

“You need not worry,  _ amarya _ ,” sighed Rei, drawing Nagisa’s head to his shoulder. “It is a sorry tale, my love—I would not have you grieved, and—”

“Who will share your burdens but for me, Rei-chan?” demanded Nagisa. “We are to be married—to bear joy and sorrow together, for as long as the gods see fit to keep us among the living.” He seized Rei’s hand and held it up before the watch-fire, shaking it this way and that so the steward might see the light reflected in the gems of his betrothal ring. “Aye, it grieves me to hear it, to know that you suffered so! But for you to recall it alone would hurt me worse, my heart.”

Rei glanced up in wonder, and for the first since that wicked morning he smiled into the darkness if treasure lay beside him. 

“Are you certain?” he asked, his voice growing gentle again as the warmth washed over his toes. “I do not doubt your mettle, Nagisa—”

“Go on, Rei,” whispered his intended, wrapping his arms about the steward’s waist. 

“Very well,” murmured Rei. “We had little water, and Sasabe had hardly a mouthful all the while—he was ready to die of thirst for our sakes, but even so it was not enough. Haru and I—you saw how I looked after him when we first came to Qasr, but before that summer it was Haru who looked after me. I was frightened to sleep alone, when I was a child, and the first night I woke him with my crying he dragged me out of my cot and into his own bed—and I did not leave it again until the spring of our eleventh year. 

“Always he thought of me before himself, and when I grew ill from the heat he took his share of the water and poured it down my throat. I had not the strength to refuse him, and for two days he had nothing, not even his ration of meat—he pressed it upon me when Aki’s back was turned, and on the third morning—” 

Rei’s voice faltered, and a sob swelled up in his throat as he looked away to the tent again. 

“His brow was hotter than the sands themselves, and Sasabe could not wake him—and for hour after hour his fever grew worse. We feared he would die, Nagisa—he had done himself a great injury, and as the weakness crept upon him he kept himself upright until he was utterly spent.

“We arrived in Sikandar on the fourth afternoon, and Haru had not stirred for a day,” he whispered. “I remember it still…Aki falling senseless to the floor the moment he saluted the king, and Sasabe carrying Haru up to the infirmary before he crumpled by his bed.”

“And then they were healed, were they not?” asked the younger lad. “For all three of you recovered, and so did your tutor.”

“Aye, in time,” sighed Rei. “Aki was well enough by the next evening, and Sasabe by the day after that. But Haru—he was deathly ill, and the moment he woke it was as if he had lost his wits. He wept night and day for his grandmother, and screamed for the Princess Kazumi until his throat was swollen shut. Not even Aki could soothe him, and he fought the healers with all his might—he would neither eat nor drink, until at last it seemed they could do nothing to save him. 

“They drugged him then, with a vial of  _ nyshk _ mild enough to calm him, and strong enough that he lost the will to resist them. He took his food as they wished him to do, but when its power was broken he did not know where he was—he lived that dreadful week anew in his dreams, and though time and again we swore to him it was over he would not believe a word, just as he did to-day. 

“He was not the same, when he was well again. The brother we knew was gone, and it seemed as if naught but a ghost was left in his place…he would not answer when we spoke to him, and for days he refused to stir from his bed. One morning I found him stretched in his bath, lying still as a corpse at the bottom of the tub—I thought he had drowned himself, but the touch of the water mended his heart better than we could hope to do. But still he was dour and sullen, and he lingered in his prison as if he did not wish to leave it. We spent eight months in Sikandar, awaiting word from home, and when we returned to Iwatobi we found it changed for ever.

“Hiromasa had taken his mother’s throne, and Aki became crown prince—and he and Haru bent all their power to aiding their parents, so that such sorrow should never come to our doors again. And it seemed as if the years drew on, Haru drew further away—until we had all but forgotten the child he once was, and not until he took Milad as his ward did I remember the prince he had been.”

At last Rei fell silent, staring into the dying embers as Milad whimpered in his sleep and buried his face in his father’s shoulder. Nagisa turned his face up to the heavens, and within his glistening eyes the moon and stars were reflected in all their glory — white and silver streaming down to rest in a pool of watered carmine, putting strength into the steward’s blood like a horn of pale ambrosia. They said nothing more as the night drew on, and by and by the dancer began to nod and crept away to the tent. Rei whispered a prayer into the darkness before he set his jaw and followed, stretching himself on the threadbare quilts beside his beloved and taking the younger lad in his arms. 

“What was I, sweetheart, that you pledged yourself to me?” he murmured, kissing the tuft of golden hair that stood like a shock of hay over Nagisa’s brow. “I hardly knew the touch of laughter before you lent me yours, and since we met—”

Nagisa laughed.“I love Rei-chan because he is Rei-chan,” he said, rising up on his elbow to peck the pointed nose. “Because he is wise and careful and kind, and would keep me from harm to the end of his days—as I shall do for him while there is breath in my body,  _ rouhiya!  _ All the world was loose and light before you, and when you came to Qasr—it was as if I saw it anew, and all my treasures were fair in their glory—and you the fairest among them!”

With that the manservant felt the deadly weight rise from his heart until it was light as a feather, careless of whatever grief awaited him. He would not face it alone, he knew, for Nagisa’s strength was deeper and warmer than his and enough to carry them both. 

“Thank you,  _ rouhiya _ ,” he choked, burying his face in the quilts. “Oh, my love—I would have withered away to nothing to-day if you had not been with me, and though I dared not ask it—I could not have gone without you, if it meant my death to remain!”

“You shall never go without me again,” swore the dancer. “If I must leave all I knew in Qasr to keep you, so I will! I would follow you to the ends of the earth, my heart, wherever you chose to roam, and if it is your wish to remain with your people, so shall it be mine.”

At long last the tent grew quiet again, and the three lads slumbered on without dreaming. Haru had not woken all the while, and lay curled against the far wall with Milad in his arms. Rei and Nagisa had gone to sleep without a notion of sorrow between them, but behind their lids the prince’s eyes were swollen and red from his weeping.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That blame the mackerel tag finally makes sense now, doesn't it.


	14. Sped By Flame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the storm is conquered, and Nagisa wants meat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late update! But to make up for it we have a beautiful piece of art by alsas, linked below!
> 
> [The Reunion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/171751448916/haru-gasped-out-a-sob-and-crumpled-across-the)

_The bedroom was shrouded in darkness, and when he opened his eyes he found it half-lit by a roaring flame. The apartment was bare, with little more than a pair of beds and a writing-desk by the window—but the covers were soft and warm, and as he lay he nearly slipped back into slumber as he watched the dancing shadows leap from the depths of the fire. A small, slender figure stood by the hearth, shorter and thinner in the shoulders than he had seen it last, and a mourning sash was fastened round its trunk and tied with a tasselled knot._

_The ivory throat was draped with a chain of glinting onyx, but this last was the work of memory alone—for Rei could not see so much as an inch of his master’s neck, obscured as it was by masses of inky hair that flowed down to his waist like a stream. As he threw back the blankets and pushed himself upright, he saw that the prince had dropped to one knee, shielding his palm with a falconer’s gauntlet as he thrust it into the coals. Rei parted his lips to call him back, but a moment later the elder boy rose to his feet and withdrew with a white-hot poker clutched in his hands._

_They curled about its handle until the long fingers went pale, lifting the rod to his magnificent head as Aki wrapped his shining hair around the shaft of the brand. At the touch it hissed and smoked like a pyre, and one by one the heavy locks were burned away from his skin and cast to the floor like a deluge of autumn leaves._

_Aki’s crown looked as if it had been shorn with a butcher’s knife, for the tufted strands near his brow were uneven and rough as a shock of hay. He put up a hand to his ear and sighed, dropping the poker back to the hearth to cool as he stumbled away to an armchair._

_“Burn mine, too.”_

_The prince sprang up and looked wildly around the chamber, slowing to a halt when his gaze came to rest on the roll of quilts piled up on the second bed. A pair of blue eyes peered out from between the covers, their lids drooping nearly shut as they blinked against the glow of the fire. Rei caught his breath and shrank back into the cushions, fumbling between them for his spectacles as Haru wriggled down to the tile and pattered away to his cousin’s side._

_“You burned off your hair for Grandmother,” said the little lad, clutching the folds of his brother’s nightshirt. “You must burn mine, too!”_

_“Indeed I shall not,” answered Aki, and his glance was sterner than they had ever seen it before. “You are far too small to wear mourning,_ shin’ainaru-ko, _and you know it as well as I.”_

_Haru looked down at the flagstones and lunged for the smoking rod, grasping in vain for its fluted handle before Aki took him by the scruff of his neck and threw him over his shoulder._

_“I will not bear such foolishness from you, Haru,” he said, holding the kicking legs to his chest until they grew still again. “I am your liege as well as your brother, and you would do well to obey me.”_

_“Please, Aki,” came the plea, followed by a storm of tears as Haru began to weep into Aki’s neck. “I know you ought not to do it, but besides my prayers at the shrine I cannot do a thing for her, and—”_

_At the sight of his swollen face Rei felt his own eyes grow damp, and as the sobs grew louder he bounded out of his bed and scampered across the floor to stand with the older lads._

_“And mine,” he whispered, taking Haru’s hand in his. “The Queen should not have died for my sake, for I am only a serving boy.”_

_“Hold your tongue!” barked Aki, slumping to his knees and pulling them into his arms as he began to weep. “Do not you dare, both of you—all the world could have been slain that night, and still I would have endured while you were left to me! She loved you better than I do, and you make up the two halves of my heart—”_

_“Then surely we have the right to bear our grief as you do,” murmured Haru, tucking his head into Aki’s collar. “I will never take a thing of you again, if only you do as I ask.”_

_“There is no need for that,” breathed the elder prince, holding them close. “May Heaven grant me the strength to refuse you some day, before you ask me for worse.”_

_With that he set them down and led them back to the hearth, burying the rod in the coals as Haru unwound his long braid and picked out the knots near his scalp. Rei cast off the ribbon that held his own plait together, slipping it into his pocket as he awaited his turn by the fire._

_At last the poker was hot again, and Haru stood as still as a mouse as Aki took hold of the shaft and burned off his tresses with breathless care. They looked as if they had been cut, for while the prince paid little mind to his own head he dared not spoil his brother’s. Haru tugged at the ends of his hair with a sigh and nodded up at his cousin, making his way to the armchair as Rei’s dark locks fell down to his feet like rain._

_*_ _*_ _*_

“Rei-chan, get up,” came the whisper from above him, followed by a tug at his sleeve as Nagisa prodded his arm. “Rei-chan—”

The steward sat up and rubbed his eyes, peering round the tent for Haru before he saw that his master had gone. There was naught but a tumbled quilt for proof that he had lain beside them at all, and its folds were cool and dry to the touch. Even Milad had crept away from the place, drawing close to the dancer’s chest for warmth in the prince’s absence. Nagisa took the steward’s hand and pointed past the length of sacking that served them for a door, following his intended out into the gloom as Rei scrambled out of the _khayma_ on hands and knees and rose to his feet again. Between the dunes the night was darker than a raven’s wing, and above them the stars had been cast into shadow by a veil of winter clouds. An idle breeze wove round the camels like a song, stirring the canvas of the tents in passing before darting away to the South.

“Where has he gone?” cried Rei, looking this way and that for his friend. For a moment he feared that Haru had wandered away into the ether, leaving naught but a hair on his pillow behind him as he renounced their land for the realm beyond—

“Hush,” breathed Nagisa, staring like a child transfixed at a slope of sand some six fathoms high at the least, standing against the deep-blue arc of the heavens like a mountain below the moon. A slender man perched at its crest like a gull blown off the coast by a storm, and as they watched he fell to his knee and struck his pale brow with his fists. It seemed to them that a golden chain hung like a nimbus round his neck, and a moment later Haru tore it from his breast and shouted like a wounded beast in the darkness. He cried out in the pointed accents of the Iwatobian speech, falling to his knees in the dust as his lament drifted on through the night unanswered.

Neither Rei nor Nagisa could hear so much as a word from him, for the wind had grown so fierce that the lads took hold of their veils to keep the sand from their faces. Haru was clad in nothing but his tunic and breeches, and as he bowed his head and stumbled down to the camp he walked with his eyes shut tight as if to fence out the world before him.

“What is the matter with him?” asked the dancer, clutching Rei’s arm in terror as they turned and ran back to the tents. “Why—Rei-chan, will he—”

“He was often so in our childhood,” sighed Rei. “When the shade descended upon him it came swiftly, and no earthly power could hope to hold it back. Betimes he would not speak for days, and in the night we heard him weeping…but we dared not say a word, for he found comfort in our presence, and it would wound him worse to find that we knew how sorely hurt he was.”

“All this while?” whispered Nagisa, stricken to the heart. “Until the both of you journeyed to Qasr?”

“Aye, all this while,” murmured the steward. “Before the court we had the second prince of Iwatobi, and Aki’s right hand as he was meant to be. With the army there stood the fourth general of the infantry, and a fairer hand with a blade there never was! But alone—I cannot say what he was alone, only that he would have rather perished than grieve us, and he felt our sorrows as he felt his own.”

That night the prince did not return to their tent, and though Rei would have kept watch by the fire until Haru saw fit to rest again, Nagisa sent him on to his bed and buttoned the entrance of the _khayma_ so that the breeze would not trouble him. The dancer pulled his veil low over his face and sat by the embers himself, stirring the ashes with a walking-stick until at last he fell asleep an hour before dawn.

* * *

“Where is Nagisa?”

The shout was followed an minute later by Momo and Sakura, bounding down the corridor in its wake as the younger Mikoshibas burst into Makoto’s bedchamber. After parting from the Iwatobians the night before he had taken his things and gone back to his own room in the next apartment, for though he had not slept there for the past month and a half he could not bear to remain in Haru’s quarters while the younger prince was absent.

“Down in the dancer’s hall, perhaps?” asked Makoto, turning his back to them and sighing into the cushions. As they watched, a calloused hand crept out from between the sheets and came to rest on the pillow beside him, seeking the palm whose lines he had learned as well as his own since the summertime. Neither of the dancers knew what to make of it, and recalling their plight they stripped the quilts from his body and pulled him up to his feet.

“Nay, he is not,” barked Sakura, running to the wardrobe and forcing a tunic over his head. “The night watch did not see him again after the eleventh bell. Momo and I meant to wait for him, but we fell asleep in the common room after they departed—he ought to have returned before long, for it is only an hour’s walk to the gates. Perhaps he fell prey to the Suhrians on the journey back—you must ready a party to search for him, Makoto!”

The prince struggled in her grasp for a moment longer before freeing himself from the garment, shaking his head at the girl as he sank back onto the bed to put on his slippers.

“That is the palace watch,” he said, stunned beyond belief to find that his heart was dull and cold as it had been since the hour he bid Haru farewell, and though the worry mounted in his blood at the thought that Nagisa had come to harm it seemed to leave him untouched. “Com, let us go to the barracks and find the men who were standing guard at the border wall last night.”

“The trading caravan departed at midnight, as it was meant to do,” cried Momo. “You need not fear for that. But nobody has seen Nagisa since, not even the vendors in the marketplace—”

At last the terror leapt up in Makoto’s stomach, and scarcely an instant later he was halfway to the first level, leaping down the steps on his long legs as Momo and Sakura hurried to match his pace. He burst through the doors to the soldiers’ barracks calling for the border guards, and once Seijurou’s second-in-command was made to understand that the head of the dancer’s guild had vanished he disappeared down the hall and returned with twenty-five men behind him, all of whom were clad in their sleeping shifts as they knelt before their liege.

“Do you speak of the lad with the jade-green veil, my lord?” inquired the youngest of the lot, once the Mikoshibas grew calm enough to speak their piece. “Master Hazuki’s son?”

“Aye, that is him,” said Makoto. “The caravan passed the gates, we know—did he bid them farewell before they went?”

“Bid them farewell?” asked the squire, looking up at the prince in question. “He departed the citadel with them, Highness, behind a man dressed all in black. There was a child on his shoulders, small enough to ride in a pack, but both were veiled from head to foot and we glimpsed nothing but their eyes.”

“Are you certain?” gasped Sakura, holding the poor boy by the shoulders and shaking him until his teeth began to chatter in his head. “He journeyed with the caravan?”

“He did, _sayidati_ ,” said the squire, breathing a sigh of relief as Makoto came to the dancer’s side and drew her gently away.

“You have my thanks, Sanim,” replied the prince. “At ease, _khafir’sha._ You are dismissed.”

With that the soldiers rose to their feet and bowed before marching away to their quarters, where they would rest until their duties began again at the second bell.  Makoto turned on his heel and trudged out into the corridor, with Momo and Sakura trailing along in his wake like a pair of lambs following their mother to pasture.

“He was meant to go ten days hence,” said Momo, glancing up at his sister in bewilderment. “After all, they were to be married three days from now.”

Sakura sighed and tugged at the ends of her hair, thinking of the sorrow of the previous afternoon. She herself had not been apart from Rin since the day of her birth, and though Rei and Nagisa had known one another for scarcely five moons she knew they would have been sorely hurt if they were sundered by the six hundred miles that lay between Qasr and Iwatobi.

“His father will be angered to hear of it, surely,” she answered. “But I would have followed Rin to the West no matter what Mother said, for he is mine, and I could not have borne it if he were taken from me.”

Makoto said nothing more, and when they parted their lips to call for him they found him gone. He had not wandered ahead to the third level, for the staircase before them was empty, and they had not yet reached the entrance hall.

Momo bid farewell to his sister at the foot of the steps, making his way to the dancers’ quarters as she went up to the chambers she shared with Rin on the fourth level. The redheaded advisor was absent, having betaken himself to the sultan’s library, and Gou sat by the fire in his best armchair as she stared into the shifting flames.

“Gou?” called Sakura, shutting the door behind her. She frowned at the sight of her sister-in-law, for her brows were drawn up in a frown as the younger girl had never seen them before.

“Where is Rin?” asked the scholar. “And Makoto—”

“Rin is with Masoto, I think,” came the reply. “What is the matter?”

“I do not believe that yesterday was the first attempt on Haru’s life,” said Gou, lifting her worried face to look her friend in the eye. “I went down to the stables this morning, to take Badr al-Din for a run—and when I passed the hook where Haru’s saddle hung with Makoto’s I saw the broken straps, and thought perhaps that Sei might send it to the marketplace to be mended so Haru would have it whole with the rest of his things.”

“It was good of you to think of him, to be sure, but what of it?”

“When I took it down from the wall, I turned it up to see how badly the bands had torn—and there on the bottom by the panels a patch of leather as wide as my hand had been burned away, just where Nafisa was hurt on the second day of the tournament.”

“ _Burned?_ ” repeated Sakura, her brows flying up like a pair of startled wings. “With a flame, do you mean?”

“With caustic,” corrected the other. “It must have eaten through the hide just as it burned Nafisa, and so when Haru pressed his weight over the wound she could bear it no longer, and threw the poor lad from her back.”

“And he lived,” murmured the dancer. “By the grace of Heaven he lived, and so they sought to kill him a second time. Have you spoken to the Queen, Gou?”

“Aye, we sought her out as soon as I returned. She is in council with Father and Lord Shigino, for bringing the Suhrians to trial shall be no simple feat. One cannot raise such a charge against them with one man’s word alone, when any of the folk at the table that night could have done it—the easterners were accounted for that morning, and amongst the servants one of their own could have slipped into the kitchens and out again before Azar could spy him.”

“It shall be done,” vowed Sakura, striking her fist with her palm. “Haru ought never to have suffered so, nor Rei, and the Suhrians will make amends with their blood if Natsuko lays hands upon them.”

“Natsuko would cleave them from throat to liver herself, if ever she knew who had hurt him,” muttered Gou. “She is no weakling, our queen, in heart or in body! the sun could be stricken from its throne ere the devils went unpunished, for hers is a power beyond the law of men.”

She raised her head and glanced at the younger girl, thinking of the sorrow her brother had known of old, wounded so harshly that for a while it seemed that love had gone from his heart. Gou herself had never been blind to his grief, for all that she could scarcely recall him before its coming—or that shattering summer that rose like a blade from the past, the summer her father was snatched from them both and lost like treasure to the sea. Neither she nor her mother could bring the lad to his joy again, for that feat was Sakura’s alone, won by the mirth of a fearless maid with fire enough for two—

“Such is the might of a woman, Sakura,” she said. “You need not fear, my sister! with a Queen such as ours for his champion he _shall_ be avenged as he ought, and all will be well again!”

* * *

The first morning with the caravan broke upon the heavens in a storm of gold and crimson, rousing the merchants from their beds as the party began to stir. Rei and Nagisa stumbled out of the _khayma_ with grit in the corners of their eyes, which they rinsed by the iron washing-pot as Haru slept on behind them. They had woken to find him lying near the mouth of the tent, facing the dunes with small Milad clutched to his bosom; the weight boded ill for his broken rib, but neither of the two had strength enough to take his son from his arms.

The guardsmen saw to the camels as the merchants prepared their breakfast, cleaning a brace of _afhiyas_ found sunning themselves on a point of stone a minute’s walk from the camp. Rei shook out the sand from his gown and darted away to the traders, offering to mind the cookfire while they parted the beasts from their skins.

Nagisa watched him go and turned back to the door of the _khayma,_ where Haru lay still like a barren field forsaken too long by the sun. Milad’s long lashes curled up from his dimpled cheeks, first against the linen by his face, and then in a silent plea for water as Nagisa sat beside him and took him into his lap.

“There you are,” he whispered, lifting the neck of his waterskin so that Milad might take his fill. He gulped at the skin like a goldfish, spilling its wealth down his chin before he thrust it away. The dancer laughed and swung him up to his shoulders, bundling the baby away to the spot where Rei sat cross-legged on a blanket with a steaming bowl at his knee.

“Eat, and then we must ready our things,” sighed the steward, passing the dish to Nagisa. “Will you see to Milad, my love?”

Nagisa nodded and turned his attention to the meal, while Rei unfolded his limbs and stalked across the sand to the tent he had shared with the others. Haru lay beneath the quilts where they had left him, still and cold as a fallen corpse before he was woken from slumber.

“Rei?” he groaned, turning his face back into the cushions. “That is your voice I hear, is it not? We were at home with Aki scarcely a moment ago, and here I am in the desert again.”

“Aye, in the flesh,” said the younger lad, feeling as if he might weep at the pallor of Haru’s brow. “How do you fare, _shin’ainaru-ko_?”

Haru blinked and pushed himself upright, unlacing the clasps at his collar to peer at the skin below.

“A draught for pain would not go amiss, I think,” he replied, clenching his jaw as the wind grew still in his chest. “The rib is worse than it was last night, and I fear it may have splintered.”

The next moment he found himself flat on his back, staring up at the dingy canvas as Rei set his fingers along the bone and probed it from stem to stern. Haru cried out and bit his lip at the touch, for the steward’s thumb had come to rest on the spot where his rib had broken.

“Splintered, you say? The pain would have served you well if it had, for you took Milad onto your chest and kept him for far too long,” grumbled Rei. “And when you had the both of us to mind him! The bone is cracked, and no more—it is only the swelling that hurts you, and a tonic will aid you enough to breathe unhindered.”

“Are you certain?” persisted Haru, eyeing the mottled bruises clustered above his heart. “If it has—”

“I am naught but a healer in training, but still I am certain enough. Your lungs are clear and strong, and unless they begin to bleed from within you need not trouble me so.”

With that he dragged the protesting prince to his feet, wiping the dust from his eyes with a cloth before leading him to the blankets spread over the earth, where the others were sitting by the cookfire to dine. Nagisa was halfway through his own breakfast, shoveling the spoonfuls into his mouth so quickly that his cheeks were as round as a squirrel’s.

Milad had eaten his fill of porridge and pickled mutton, and if not for the length of ribbon binding him to Nagisa’s girdle he would have wandered between the dunes to seek out his father for himself. He shrieked for joy as the Iwatobians came near, kicking his little feet at the quilt as Haru took to his heels and bolted away from his friend, snatching the baby up in his arms and covering his face with kisses.

“Milad, _radhiy_ ,” he sighed, clasping the child to his heart. “Have you broken your fast, my darling?”

The small fists beat like a pair of wings on his shoulder, and a moment later Milad struggled down to the dust and buried his toes in the sand. The shifting warmth had enthralled the baby completely, just as the bathing-pools had done on that morning so long ago—after he conquered his fright, at least, and paddled along through the shallows with Makoto and Ren at his tail.

“I am glad you are pleased with the journey, at least,” whispered Haru, burying his nose in a tuft of raven hair as Milad poked out his tongue at Rei. “Make merry while you can, _shin’ainaru-ko_ , for the sands of the West tare not so kind as these.”

“This late in the year?” asked Nagisa, looking up in wonder. “Ought it not to be winter, then?”

“We know no seasons in Sahrastan but drought and monsoon,” said the prince. “And both of the pair are hotter than hellfire, as my uncle used to say.”

Haru himself would speak no more after that, and he could not be persuaded to eat so much as a mouthful. Rei’s lips went white as he pushed the bowl away untouched, and though he raised his voice and scolded as he had not been made to do for the last six months, his master would not obey him. Nagisa put down his spoon and glared at the prince’s back, for this last seemed no better than foolishness to him.

But he could not keep hold of his temper for long, for the anguish in the deep-blue eyes was plain as day to them all—Rei had known its shadow all his life, and foreign though it was to him it frightened the dancer unspeakably.

He had often pondered the love between the two brothers, for his own sisters were older by far than Nagisa was himself; the youngest of the three had been married when he was a child of seven, and after their weddings he saw them no more than thrice or four times a year. Makoto was nearly a father to the twins, he thought, for never in all their years had they sought their parents for comfort, turning instead to their brother’s arms to soothe their hurts away. Rin had spent all his life defending his sister’s honor, or so the poor lad believed—he had stopped a good share of her trysts with the general in their childhood, but for every one he caught five more were carried out in perfect secrecy, aided by Momo and Sakura.

Lord Mikoshiba’s three children were nearly identical in body and heart, as if they were carved from a single brick of clay, each fiery head akin to the next as the left eye was akin to the right. There was little need for speech between them, for the thoughts of one were clearly reflected in the minds of the others. Ren and Ran were just as closely bound, he thought, bound as a lock clinging fast to its key—different as the dusk from the dawn, and so they made up the two halves of a whole.

Haru and Rei were but prince and servant in name, and still the steward was dearer to his master’s heart than most—one to be chastened and guarded and comforted, as Rei had said, and then a pillar of solace to the elder lad after Sahrastan was laid to waste by a trail of Dhaikan flame, after Haru had driven himself to the brink of a sandy grave so Rei might live to greet another morning—

It seemed that a single bloodstream ran like a thread of ichor between them, carrying the strength of the younger lad away from his veins to restore the might of the first. Rei would know nothing of happiness while Haruka grieved, not if all the hopes of his boyhood were sung to life before him, and in turn the manservant’s sorrow returned to his friend and deepened its thrall until it lay twice as heavily in the prince’s throat as it had lingered in Rei’s.

Nagisa got to his feet and put on his slippers, leaving Rei on the quilt behind him with Milad as he staggered off over the sand to the remains of the tent _,_ where Haru had folded their blankets and piled them on the tarpaulin that served them for a floor. The four arched poles were tied together, secured by the canvas shelter, and but for a set of dints in the earth there was no proof of the _khayma_ ’s presence.

“Haru-chan,” said the dancer, gritting his teeth as Haru stopped in his tracks before tucking the baby’s poppet into his girdle. “Let the tent alone, and go back for your breakfast at once.”

Rei would not have dared address him so, Nagisa knew; since the terror of the previous afternoon the steward had hardly dared to speak above a whisper, lifting his voice only when his master worried him to to the verge of weeping. The dancer narrowed his eyes and set a hand on his waist, striking a traveling-cloak from the prince’s grasp and swinging him round by the wrist to glare up into his face.

“Your hearing is keen enough, Haru-chan, and it is folly to carry on as you are doing.”

Haru said nothing, turning back to the crumpled mantle by his feet before shaking the sand from its hem and clasping it round his neck. A sigh broke loose from the dancer’s lips as he wondered for a moment at his pride, at his hope to soothe the Iwatobian’s wounded heart where Rei had failed to heal it—

“How can you hurt him so, Haru? You are dearer than life to him, I know, and so must he be to you—what would it be, do you think, if you saw him so bleak as you are? You will grow ill again without enough to sustain you, and he shall wear himself to the bone to put your fault to rights!”

“Nagisa—”

“I know how sorely it hurt you, Haru-chan,” begged Nagisa, taking the slender hands in his. “To recall her Majesty’s death as you did with the _ahen_ , and then to be parted from Makoto—and there _will_ be time to grieve, when you and Rei are safe in Aki’s arms again! But not here, _shin’ainaru-ko_ , not now that you have been ill—you must do all in your power to hold yourself upright, for Rei’s sake and for Milad’s if not for your own, for you are as the sun to them, and as you lie here in darkness they walk through the shadow beside you.”

The prince did not protest again as Nagisa led him back to the others, and neither did he refuse the bowl of meat and porridge that Rei set down on his knee. He ate away at the savory lamb until he had emptied the dish to its bottom, scouring it out with sand before one of the younger merchants came to fetch it.

Rei glanced over his brother’s head at Nagisa, who was hovering at Haru’s shoulder and grinning into his sleeve as Milad dived over the quilt for the sweetmeats he had in his pockets. The steward felt his eyes grow damp again at the sight of the lad he loved so well, chortling under his breath as he tempted the baby into his lap with a sachet of candied roses.

He choked on his tears and buried his head in his hands, kissing the pair of amethysts that shone like a brace of stars on his finger.

* * *

By the third afternoon Nagisa had grown used to the heat, no longer shutting his eyes against the wind when he rode before his intended. He sat with Rei’s arm about his waist to keep him from falling, crying out in glee as he spotted a clump of indigo blooms growing beside a floodbed. The rusty channel was filled with inky _sahalias_ basking in the sun, and though the merchants grew queasy at the sight of them, the soldiers caught a basketful and fried them with chestnuts for luncheon, leaving their heads for the serpents before the party dined on the rest.

Rei and Haru had eaten them often enough in their youth, once the princes were old enough to journey between the provinces each year with their fathers. Haru thought the lizards palatable enough, and downed a handful of legs while he shredded the meat for Milad.

“Rei-chan,” sang Nagisa, waving a skewer beneath the steward’s nose. “You ought to take your fill before they are cold—it was weary work to catch them, and with the nuts they taste no worse than fish or fowl.”

“It is heartier stuff than mackerel,” said Haru, tipping his waterskin to Milad’s mouth. “I could never tell why you despise them so.”

The manservent pursed his lips and set a morsel between them, gritting his teeth as it vanished down his gullet. One of the bearded traders snorted into his goblet and set himself to coughing; Nagisa snickered through his mouthful of wine, spraying his betrothed from head to foot with liquor.

“Oh, stop your laughing,” said Rei, taking a second piece. “Not all of us were fashioned as you were, with a stomach to bear the strangest of things and foolish enough to eat them.”

Once the company had emptied their plates, they doused the smouldering fire and set off on their way again, drawing their hoods low over their faces as the camels plodded westward. Rei sat before Nagisa to shield him from the breeze, while Haru wrapped Milad in a heavy shawl and tied him close to his chest.

“I would give him to Nagisa if I were you,” called the steward, wiping a clod of sand from his tongue.

“He is my son, is he not? Then he shall ride with me, and it matters nothing if my rib cannot bear it,” grumbled Haru, setting his chin in a pout.

An hour later they came to a dusty ridge, bordered by a wall of dunes to the south and a yellowing sky to the east. The clouded horizon shone gold in the sunlight, glinting among the rays like a shower of petals as Nagisa laughed for joy at its beauty.

“Look, Rei-chan!” he called, shaking Haru from his daze as he pointed to the dunes that lay far to the south of the caravan. “How lovely! Is that a _sak’aku,_ then, where for the heat the heavens are mirrored upon the earth?”

Rei frowned and took off his spectacles, cleaning the circles of glass with his veil before pressing them back to his face. He turned in the saddle and squinted away into the distance, narrowing his eyes at the swirling mist.

“Your eyes are sharper than mine,” he muttered, yanking at the reins. Haru shook his head as if to clear it, staring at the union of sand and sky as if he could scarcely believe what it he saw.

“The _khamsin_ ,” breathed the prince. He brought his own steed to a halt and shouted over the wind, cupping his fingers to his mouth to shield the cry as Rei’s own lips parted in astonishment.

“The _khamsin?_ ” echoed Nagisa, plucking at the steward’s sleeve. “What does he mean, Rei?”

“ _Halt!_ ”

The scream rang out like the blast of a cannon, stopping the traders in their tracks as the headsman’s camel went to its knees. Haru’s was the next to follow, sinking into the dust and turning its head to the west as the prince leapt over the saddlehorn and tumbled down its side. All about them the soldiers’ beasts were doing the same, and as their feet made purchase on the ground the guards dove into their packs for their waterskins.

“Hurry, _rouhiya_ ,” said Rei, urging Raiha down to the sands. He rummaged in his girdle and drew out a pair of masking-cloths, passing the first to Nagisa before wetting the second and tying it over his face. The dancer furrowed his brow and glanced back at Haru, who was coaxing small Milad into a mask of his own with a piece of sugared fruit.

“Dampen your veil, my love.”

Nagisa took the flask from the steward’s hands and dashed it across his mantle, staining the piece of linen from top to bottom before passing the bottle back to Rei. He stoppered the vessel and hung it at his belt again, calling to his master in the Iwatobian speech as the traders drew their camels together to shield them against the gale.

“Not more than an hour,” screeched one of the merchants’ sons, answering in the common tongue. “It will be upon us before long, my lord!”

“What is the matter?” The younger lad took hold of his intended’s wrist and dragged him back to his side, glowering up into the high-boned face before Rei bent down and brushed his lips over Nagisa’s forehead in remorse.

“A sandstorm,” said the manservant. “It is rare indeed, for one to stray so far to the east—have you never seen one before?”

“Only thrice, and then from far away,” replied Nagisa. “It was naught but a dusty cloud by the hour it reached the citadel.”

“This is no dustwind, child,” snorted one of the traders. “We will be as blind as bats when it strikes, and the camels must be bound by then.”

Within each pack was a length of cord tied to a pair of hooks, made to clasp through the stirrups to keep the beasts from straying. In half a minute the camels were tied together, and their hulking backs were pointed into the gale as the caravan readied itself for the storm.

Nagisa frowned back at the horizon, shuddering against the wind at the sight of the golden clouds. The dancer had passed his eighteen years in the kindly suns of Qasr, knowing only the best of its might and beauty. The lilting zephyrs of the west had ever been friendly to him, toying with his hair by the windows and beckoning him out to the gardens so their fingers might have the joy of kissing the silk at his brow.

He pulled his mantle closer about his shoulders and wished with all his might that he and Rei were safe in the palace again, watching Lili and Momo and Malka practice their pieces for the lay of Dahab-E-Noor, listening to the commotion of Haru and Makoto bounding down the corridors with Rin as they readied the gifts for Haru’s betrothal night…

“The desert is a cruel Queen, Nagisa,” said Haru, setting a comforting hand on his. “This is far milder than her worst, and that you shall never see—not on our watch, for while Rei and I have breath in our lungs her fury will not touch you.”

They stood and looked at the advancing clouds for a while longer, and nothing short of an explosion could have drawn their gazes away. The two navigators had set up their tools, measuring the slope of the billows against the slanting sun, and muttering together in their own tongue—the speech of Ram-Susah and Tirah Alis, Nagisa thought—they scratched a set of figures on the ground before scuffing them out with their boots, turning to the leader of the merchants with anxious faces.

“Half a mile at least, my Lord. I doubt we can go further until nightfall.”

“Half a mile _high?_ ” shrieked Nagisa. “The clouds will smother us, surely—”

“Nay, they will not,” promised Rei. “As long as you wear your veil, you need not fear for a moment, and we are far from the dunes. They will not bury us, _rouhiya_.”

Nagisa bit his lip and turned to the prince, seeking an oath from the elder lad to comfort him—only to find that Haru was squinting towards the west, shading his eyes from the light as he tilted his head to his shoulder.

“Rei.”

The word was quiet and still, and yet it carried some nameless foreboding, ringing out above the gale though Haru had spoken softly enough to go unheard. The guardsmen fell silent and left the camels to themselves, padding through the dust to the young man’s side as they followed his pointing finger. Nagisa caught at Rei’s hand and ran after them, pausing behind his intended as a muffled groan arose from the merchants’ lips.

“Brigands,” whispered Haru. “They must have found our trail where we halted for luncheon at noon.”

The streak of black and grey on the western skyline was thinner and slighter than the shade of the clouds to the east, but the weight that slid into Nagisa’s stomach at the sight was sickening enough that he thought he would fall to his knees.

“What shall we do?” cried one of the traders. “Our guard matches half their numbers, at best—”

“There is nothing for it,” said the headsman, stilling his trembling legs as he turned on his heel and started back to the others. “We cannot hope to best them—we shall have to outrun the band, while the storm is before us.”

* * *

Haru was swept up in the tumult as the party ran back to the kneeling beasts, unhooking their bonds and urging them up to their feet. Milad was wailing in his arms, having sensed Nagisa’s fear, and Rei had the dancer’s hands in a deathly grip as he hurried him into the saddle before taking his camel’s reins and tugging her closer to Haru’s.

But Raiha would not stir a muscle, and Haru cursed himself for having forgotten from whence the creatures had come. The animals were born and bred in Qasr, suited for milder climes and certainly not for weathering sandstorms such as the one bearing down upon them. They would never dare to walk through the blinding dust as an Iwatobian camel would do in a heartbeat, caring little for the flying grit as it plodded on through the darkness.

All about him the beasts were shying away from their keepers, tossing their heads and roaring at the seething skies to the east. Many of the merchants had broken into sobs, pleading with the brutes to shift their weight, but to no avail, for they set back their ears and refused to walk. One by one they knelt to the sands again, pointing their tails to the rising storm and their heads away so that they could not see the gloom of the lengthening shadows. Haru hissed a prayer and looked at the company of guardsmen: forty strong, while the bandits numbered seventy at least. But the soldiers had known the touch of lance and bow and shield from childhood, longer perhaps than he had known them himself—and the bandits had naught but their bloodlust to fuel them, living as they did between the spoils of the men who fell prey to their weapons. A single Qasrian was easily a match for a pair of brigands, and if the camels refused to journey east—

“Take Milad,” said Haru, placing the child into his brother’s arms. Milad hiccuped and swallowed at once, reaching out for his father’s hand the moment the two were parted.

“ _Mama_ ,” he wept, sniffling so that Haru’s heart nearly broke in half to watch him. “ _Mama—_ ”

“Do not cry, _radhiy_ ,” whispered the prince, drawing near and kissing the tiny forehead. “There is but one course left to us now, and you must remain with Nagisa and Rei.”

Rei’s eyes grew wide as Haru pressed his lips to Milad’s little palm, for the kiss was a kiss of farewell—given without hope of another, and when the prince took hold of his Muna’s bridle and pulled with all his might the steward gasped in horror—for Muna rose to her feet, looking her master in the eye as he began walking backward with the dimming rays of the sun shining full on his face.

“They will go to the west, as long as the storm is behind them!” called Haru, turning to the group of guardsmen. “Follow my lead, _jundiina,_ for if we cannot outrun the brigands we must defeat them before they can reach the caravan.” He reached up to the saddle and fumbled in the smaller pack, sure that its weight was such that more than his garments was hidden away within it.

The next moment he found what he sought, for his fingers closed around a gilded scabbard bound to the hilt with string. For a moment he eyed the knots in confusion, for the tidy loops of thread were not the work of his steward—nor Sakura’s, he was sure—

And the memory broke over his head with the force of a cannon’s blast, the memory of sitting in the study beside his chambers with Makoto, surrounded by gifts for the betrothal night to be wrapped and adorned with bits of shining ribbon—of fingers longer and broader than his, and defter by far with the ends of green and violet satin.

He warbled a laugh and cut the string in two, brushing the pieces gently into the sand before hefting the sabre and thrusting it into his belt. The soldiers followed suit, swinging up to their saddles and rummaging for their weapons before nudging their beasts in the side and directing them to follow the prince.

“We must stretch a barrier in the path, as far away as we can meet them,” said Haru, turning to the men nearest him. “The five of you there shall remain to guard the caravan, lest one of the devils slips past our net.”

They went without protest, slipping down to the sand and unsheathing their scimitars as they stood before the merchants. Nagisa sat in Raiha’s saddle with Milad clutched to his neck, and both were weeping as if they no longer had the strength to fight their tears. Rei’s high-boned face was white and frightened, and as Haru made to mount his steed he threw himself to the ground and ran like the wind to meet him.

“You cannot go,” he gasped, clutching his friend by the shoulders. “ _Shin’ainaru-ko_ , you are wounded—from falling from Nafisa’s back, from the fever, from having nearly _drowned_ —what good will your left arm be, with a broken rib? Haru, see sense—I beg of you—”

Haru chuckled and shook his head, and it seemed that the prince had resigned himself—for despite his hope they were nearly twice outnumbered; some of their company must surely fall, and he was the weakest among them.

“It is only Death, my brother, and his feet have dogged my trail through the desert since you and I were lads. Do not fear him, Rei! he has come for me today, perhaps, and I have thwarted him long enough—but the three of you shall depart this place alive, if there is any kindness in Heaven at all for my sake.”

And with that the prince vaulted up into his seat and barked out a headsman’s call, low and fierce and shrill, directing the camels to sway towards the west where the brigands grew ever clearer in the distance. Their war cries echoed across the plain like the knell of his master’s doom, and his throat tightened so that he could scarcely breathe. Perhaps they would never see one another again, he thought—but still he dared not bid Haru farewell, though the terrible voice in his breast seemed to whisper that the brother he knew would never return to his side.

* * *

_From youth to manhood I was bound to your shadow—come forth and claim me then, if you dare! You thirst for the second lord of my clan as we thirsted that year for the rain, and now I am yours for the taking—but still I have two strong arms and a blade in my hands, and you shall have to best all three before you lay a finger on my heart!_

* * *

Haru had known little of the brigands before the day Makoto was carried back from the desert so long ago, riding before the General with a gaping wound in his side—for the harshness of the Iwatobian sands was fierce enough that not a soul could live for long beyond the shelter of the kingdoms. The brigands belonged to the eastern Three, to Qasr and Alis and Ram-Susah, and there the borders were their country; they preyed upon caravans near to the realms from whence they had come, and where they struck they never left a soul among the living.

The warning had been apt, he thought, for the moment they clashed in battle he found that the scent of blood drove the camels mad, so that many a guardsman was thrown from his steed and tumbled down to the soil. Neither could the bandits remain astride their own beasts, lest they be wounded in the leg by the soldiers flying towards them—and almost as one the masked figures sprang lithely from their saddles and fell on the soldiers with all their might.

As Haru’s feet hit the ground he drew his blade and struck one of the sandmen into the dust with a blow to the head, dodging away from another as the tip of a jagged scimitar tore through the flesh of his shoulder. He had never been wounded in battle in all his life, and his breath quickened at the shock as the blood swelled forth from the rent in his sleeve and ran down like a stream to vanish into the sand below. A pair of brigands set upon him at once, nearly severing his arm at the wrist before the hired guard beside him made quick work of them with his crossbow, firing one bolt and then another so swiftly that the shots sang out together. The bodies collapsed like poppets cut from their strings, parted from their will in an instant—and Haru snatched up the mace that fell to earth between them, bringing it down on a battered helm as its keeper’s _kaskara_ came forth to pierce the prince’s side. The Iwatobian pulled his weapon close to his breast and whirled out of the path of the blade, dodging away to the rest the moment he knew that his foe would not rise again.

They had never been trained in combat, surely, for there was no grace to their movements, none of the steady assurance that Haru and Aki had known since the day they first set hands to a practice blade. But still they fought as the princes did not—as they could never hope to do, for the brigands sought to kill so they might eat for another moon or two, while the Qasrians were made to defend themselves against an enemy they would have passed unchallenged if the choice had been left to them.

For nearly an hour they wove back and forth, gaining perhaps a foot here and a fathom there—until the sandmen shouted out with guttural throats in the Qasrian tongue, hardening the words so the guards could not hear them at all. Haru and the soldiers found themselves driven back, leaping over the fallen bodies as they made to shield the caravan. None of their own had perished, though one of the sentries had been wounded in the thigh. His liege took him by the hand and dragged him along in his wake, kicking one of the brigands at the knee so that he crumpled into the rising dust at their feet.

At once he found that they stood before the camels, perilously close to the merchants sheltering against them—perilously close to Nagisa and Milad and Rei, with no defense but the line of crimson robes fighting tooth and nail to guard them from destruction. Haru darted back and turned to meet the rogue that crept up behind him, hefting his gilded sword and forcing him away from the caravan where Milad was wailing in Nagisa’s arms, clutching desperately at the dancer’s collar as Rei stood with a lance outstretched before him. At the voice of his son he found that the strength surged into his limbs anew, for he knew he could not see Milad hurt, nor Nagisa and Rei, not if he himself were slain a hundred times to keep them safe—

But it was easier said than done to reach them, and scarcely a moment later he found himself at the end of an iron club as he struggled on toward the others. Haru ducked his head and missed its path by a hairsbreadth, lifting his wounded arm to strike before shoving one of the younger foot soldiers out of the track of a mace. A heavy broadsword whistled through the air by the prince’s ear as he stood back to back with the dark-haired archer, and as the Iwatobian pushed the other man aside he found that the rogue before him was half a foot taller at least than Haruka himself, though perhaps Haru was the heavier between them—for the brigand was painfully thin, and the bones of his face stood forth like a line of jagged rocks beneath his swarthy flesh.

His limbs seemed frail to the eye, but when the silver sabre was ripped from the prince’s fingers he saw that the man was unarmed—his weapon had been lost, or perhaps he had never borne one, but his spider’s hands were weapon enough for him—for an instant later he caught the prince in a chokehold, sinking his thumbs into the skin as Haru gasped and flailed like a fish in his arms.

They struggled together for a minute or more, for his foe had the strength of a python, crushing his body from hip to throat as he fought to free himself from the deathly grasp. Haru leaned to the side and sank his teeth into the sunburned wrist, tasting blood on his mouth before he scrambled down to pick up his sword and face the man again. In the instant he turned away the brigand had found a scimitar on the sand, and the look he turned upon Haru’s face was one he wished never to see again—hard and cold and fierce as a demon’s—and yet it seemed that there was naught in the deep-brown eyes but doubt and fear and hunger. The prince lifted his wounded arm to strike, but the blow never found its mark—for an armored fist collided with his chest like a sledgehammer, crushing his heart so fiercely that the broken rib gave way and snapped in half beneath it.

The bellow that left his lips was the scream of a beast led to slaughter, for never in his life had he known such pain—the very touch of the breeze was torture, forcing its way down his throat as he struggled to hold his breath. The world grew pale about him, and his skull shattered into fire as he fell to the sand. It seemed that knives and hooks were warring with his body, each seeking to claim the better half for themselves, and he heard Rei crying his name as if from out of a dream—for as the shadow loomed over his brow it rose to his eyes from within, and the din of the battle faded away into darkness with the light of the distant sun.    

* * *

The moment he saw his brother in the brigand’s grasp, Rei shrieked out in horror and scrambled between the camels for a lance, one of the weapons left behind by the soldiers before they rode off to meet the brutes as far from the merchants as they could. Nagisa said nothing, but his sobs grew louder as he watched his beloved tighten his veil and run to meet the others, throwing dirt into the air in his wake as he went. .

The lance was heavy and hollow in his hands, both sturdy and slight as he hefted it up to his shoulder and bolted away from Nagisa to the spot where Haru lay sprawled in the dust with his kaskara beneath him. The pointed barb shone like a tooth as he stood before his master’s fallen body, mighty as Rei himself could not hope to be. He was naught but a serving boy touched by the grace of a fallen Queen, gentle and mild and timid as a dove—until Nagisa’s weeping drifted back to him like a chill, until he glimpsed the stream of scarlet seeping forth from the prince’s gown—

“You shall not touch him, you devil!” he screamed, thrusting his spear forward with all his might. The bandit wrestled the weapon away and broke off the blade for good measure, bearing down upon the younger lad and clutching him in arms as he had done to Haru. But Rei was taller and heavier than Haru was, and though he had never in his life set hands to a sword he had often grappled with Aki in his childhood. It was thus that the brigand found his second quarry stronger and quicker than the first, until he drew back his head and propelled it into Rei’s. The manservant’s spectacles fell into the sand, and the ache that rippled through his temples was blinding enough to still him—and so he was dragged against the brigand’s chest, with an icy blade at his throat.

* * *

Haru could not tell how long he had lain in the dust, when consciousness returned to him—only that the sand beneath his stomach was dark and wet with blood, and the _kaskara’s_ blade was red as rust from the veins of the men he had killed that day. The pain pulsed on through his body like the beat of a cruel drum, wringing bone and nerve and sinew until it seemed that its might had flayed him open, leaving him bare to the cruel suns and the approaching storm to the east.

But though he could not stir a muscle he heard as clearly as ever, and the cries he heard were Rei’s: matched pitch for pitch with Nagisa’s, for one was howling in agony and the other in deadly fear—he could not bear it, he knew, not for another moment—

In later years he could never have told from whence the vigor had come, to pull him up to his feet—but there he found himself, lifting the sabre in trembling fingers and struggling over the ground to reach his friend. Rei was clasped in the brigand’s arms, writhing like an eel to break free, but the vicelike grip around the steward’s trunk was so fierce that his face was the mottled blue of a corpse hauled forth from the sea. The jagged edge of a knife had bitten into his throat, staining his dusty collar with a pool of crimson ichor.

Haru staggered and began to run, and as he moved the life flowed back to his legs—fueling them on with naught but the dying rasp of his brother’s voice, and dulling the torment in his breastbone as he curled his limbs and sprang up onto the brigand’s back. The blow caught the man by surprise, giving Rei time enough to throw himself to the side and snatch up his lance again. The prince flung his weight forward, so that he and the brigand fell to the ground with Haru astride the fleshless body below him. He put a hand to his waist and took his dagger from the sheath, clutching a handful of matted hair between his fingers and yanking it close to his knee—

“ _Halt!”_

He did not pause, for never in all his days had he known such anger—that the man at his feet would dare set a hand on Rei, would dare take his broken weapons and wound him—

_“Halt, I beg of you!”_

The prince frowned and looked up, stunned beyond measure to find the sandmen dropping their swords into the sand. The guards bounded forth and restrained the lot, and Haru saw that twenty at least of the brigands had fallen. They were young, he noticed, younger perhaps than he was himself, but kneeling between a pair of soldiers with bloody scrapes on their cheeks was a man with grey in his hair and beard. His eyes were fixed upon Haru’s, and tears were pouring silently down his face like dew down a glass in winter.

“Spare him, my Lord,” he gasped, planting his forehead in the dust. “He will not touch you again—do not kill him! Slay me if you like, but spare my son!”

Haru’s rage found voice in a roar, swelling forth from his breast without a care for his broken rib as he screamed at the bandit before him.

“See what he has done!” he shouted, pointing to the wound at Rei’s neck with a shaking finger. It seemed that the hurt was was only skin-deep, for already the blood had slowed its fall, and Rei himself looked none the worse for his injury as he leaned on the shaft of a spear. “We had done you no harm, any of you, and yet you found our marks in the sand and hunted our trail like beasts—what mercy is he owed, _shar’irhad_ , that I should spare his life?”

“None,” sobbed the brigand, clapsing his hands by his breast. “None—only that he did not choose to follow my path—only that he was driven to it, for we would have starved to death if we had not robbed the caravans in the desert—spare him, Lord, I beg of you—”

“Nay,” breathed Haru, winding the straggling locks tighter about his wrist. “He will go forth and kill just as he would have killed me, and my brother, and I will not have another lot of travelers suffer your wrath as we have done.”

He set the flat of the blade to the young man’s throat, seeking the great vein that throbbed like a drum beneath his hand. The father shrieked in despair and fought the grasp of the two soldiers that held him, weeping like a child as he watched the edge of the prince’s knife—

“ _Shin’ainaru-ko_.”

It was the Iwatobian speech that startled him, and he turned to see Rei standing in his shadow. There was tenderness deeper than a mother’s adoration in his gaze, and the glance was one that Haru had often seen from Aki—boundless and warm and free as the heavens, taking him back to the the balmy skies of his boyhood—

“Put down your weapon, Haru,” said Rei, setting a hand on his shoulder. “He is no threat to you now—you are no murderer, my brother, to kill a man you have bested already—”

“ _Rei_ —”

“Put it down, my heart.”

Before he had realized it in the blade lay secure in its sheath again, and the old brigand began to wail so that his voice could not be heard at all. The son had said nothing all the while, for as he lay beneath Haru he had frozen like a cornered stag, hardly daring to breathe lest he invite his death to claim him.

“What will I do, then?” he barked, turning back to the stricken father. “You will starve to death if you do not carry on as you have, and we cannot let you return to the desert so—for you will strike innocent folk again if we release you, and that I shall not abide.”

The man hung his head and wept into his tattered sleeves, but he dared not deny it—as Haru had known he would not, for there was but one way forth for brigands and soldiers alike, and bloody though it might be one or the other would have to embark upon it and see it through to its end.

“Perhaps they need not starve,” murmured Rei, lifting his voice over the dusty wind. The storm had drawn closer, and from where they stood it could be no more than a quarter of an hour away.

“What do you mean?” rasped the youth at Haru’s feet. “Of course we shall starve—we must starve or kill, and there are little ones who would perish without our spoils—”

“None of the five kingdoms would receive you,” said the steward, mopping the blood from his neck. “But perhaps—perhaps with Haru’s blessing, one might be willing to take your women and children into its borders—though I cannot speak for what justice they would deliver upon you. They nearly lost their prince to your kin, two months past, and mayhap the sultan would rather kill you than capture you.”

Masoto’s kindly face swam before Haru’s eyes for a moment, his eyes drawn up in laughter as he bounced small Milad in his arms—closely followed by the queen’s in all its haunting beauty, dancing in the square during the Goddess’s festival two weeks before—

“They would not lay a hand upon you,” he murmured, loosening his hold of the lad beneath him. “I know them as I know my own parents, and they are as gentle a pair of monarchs as ever walked the earth.”

“For my daughter’s sake I would accept whatever justice awaited me,” whispered one of the bandits, covered in dust and dressed all in ashy green. Haru’s eyes grew wide, for the brigand was a woman—not a day over twenty-five, and suddenly he thought of Jun—only three years younger, with naught to concern her but the gowns and gifts for her wedding.

“It will not be harsh, _sayidati_ ,” said the prince. “Leave all but the weapons you have need of to hunt, and bury your dead with dignity—I shall pen a message for you to carry, and the general of Sardahan is a goodly man. None of his prisoners has suffered so much as a scratch under his guard, on my word.”

She made as if to nod, before looking back to the bearded man and glancing down to her feet. He shook his head, hanging his head on his breast as Haru lifted his brows in question.

“We cannot read,” he explained. “For myself and my son, I would take your writing and go where you willed, but with my men with me—to accept it without knowing what word I carried—”

Haru frowned; it seemed to him that they ought to accept his letter with grace, but a reproving stare from Rei persuaded him to think on the matter a moment longer. The man had spoken truly, he realized—though he would never have the heart for such a thing he could have simply written to the sultan and asked that the brigands be killed, and surely any king but Masoto would have gladly indulged his wish.

“Then will you carry this instead?” asked the prince, slipping off his betrothal ring. It would be as good as his seal in the Qasrian court, and perhaps better, for all the assembly knew the gem that Ran had placed on his finger so long ago, while beyond the royal family only Lord Shigino and Seijurou’s father might be counted upon to recall his insignia. “This ring is good enough to speak on my behalf, and if you present it before the sultan and queen they will not doubt you for a moment.”

The pieces of lapiz lazuli twinkled in the sun, having darkened to violet with blood where once they had been bluer than his eyes. He rose from the back of the lad who had broken his rib, feeling its crushing pain anew as he went to the man who still knelt between the pair of guards, bleeding from the mouth where the dark-haired archer had hit him.

“Aye,” said the brigand, bowing as well as he was able. He held up a weathered hand and received the jewel in his palm, nodding at his fellows as they thrust the last of their weapons into the dust. The lances and broadswords lay like pieces of driftwood on the shore, while hunting daggers and crossbows found their perches again as the sandmen climbed to their feet.

One by one they came before the prince and bowed, touching his pointed slippers with their foreheads before they made to lay their fallen to rest. Once they had paid their respects they upturned the bodies and sobbed over the silent faces, until the Qasrians could bear it no longer and turned away to the west again.

As they faced the caravan a great shout of dismay broke from their throats together, for the storm was upon them—heavy and dark, advancing swifter than a running horse as they stumbled back to the place where the merchants still crouched beside the kneeling camels. They were welcomed with shouts and tears of relief, and Rei went directly to his betrothed and clasped him in his arms, carrying him bodily down to the sands with Milad as they sheltered against Raiha’s leeward side.

The winds broke over their heads like the breath of a shadowy nightmare, high and fierce and sharp enough to drill into their ears. Rei and Haru knelt on either side of Nagisa, wondering how by the grace of Heaven they had been left alive. The bandits had been swallowed by the gale, or perhaps they had already begun their journey; surely their beasts would not fear the _khamsin,_ as the merchants’ camels did.

As the minutes went by it seemed to Haru that the pain in his chest grew worse, until the breath was taken from his lungs and left him gasping. He grasped Nagisa’s wrist and felt a comforting touch in return, drawing wind enough to hum a lullaby to Milad to soothe him.

Suddenly he remembered Rei’s warning from their first afternoon in the desert, and as the stabbing ache pierced his body again he put his fingers to his lips and found that they came away hot and wet, wet with liquid far too thick for the dampness of his mouth, and warm enough that it had surely spilled from an open vein within him. Haru sighed as he collapsed against Raiha’s neck, for he knew there was no surcease for a lung pierced as badly as his had surely been. Perhaps it was fitting, that he had been slain so—fighting the teeth of the desert as a man, where the chance for flight was denied him. It wearied him so, to flee the kingdoms that had been home to him—first Iwatobi in his childhood, and then the Qasrian citadel...

He whispered a prayer of thanksgiving as the bloodstains grew dark on his gown, and the joy that sang through his heart was fresh and bright as the rising sun in its glory. Death had come to his door again, and that morning he warred with the blade of its scythe alone. Aki was lost to him now, ensconced in a sunlit castle half a thousand miles away, but Rei and Milad and Nagisa were Haru’s own to guard—with his life, if need be, and so for their sakes he had given it.

* * *

They knelt against the camel’s side for an hour or more, pressing their veiled faces into its hair as they shielded one another from the sand; Nagisa sat between Haru and Rei, with Milad clutched to his chest and the elder lads guarding him with their shoulders on either side. The traders’ steeds had faded away before them, for the golden haze grew deeper and darker as the shrieking wind swept over their backs like a deluge. At last it seemed as if night had fallen, brought upon the plain by the might of the dusty clouds, and the rasping cry of the storm tore at their ears until they covered themselves with a saddleblanket and turned their heads to the east.

The pulse at the dancer’s throat was swifter than the breath of the gales, for never in all his life had he witnessed such a thing before. He was born to the gentle warmth of Sardahan, half-way between desert and field; all he knew of the _khamsin_ was the darkness it lent to the Qasrian horizon now and then, and even at its worst it was naught but a smudge of grey glimpsed for a moment through Rin’s best spyglass. But there in the midst of a wasteland he learned its power as it was, one without a morsel of kindness for the men and beasts who trod within it—one that drove the sandmen from kingdom to kingdom in their anguish, fierce and cruel and sharp enough to plunge a city into ruin and shatter a prince’s heart.

As they huddled together in the dust, it seemed somehow that a drop of rain fell through the rising sand to his sleeve—warm and heavy as the skies from whence it came, and welcome as the gates of home after the toil of the past three days. He dared not speak, for fear the dirt would fly into his mouth, but as Haru pressed closer to his knee the younger lad thought that perhaps the shower would soothe him if it outlasted the end of the storm.

The prince’s fingers grew tight about Nagisa’s wrist, and he patted the calloused palm as best he could before bracing himself against another gust of wind. Milad whimpered in his lap, and from the place beside him he heard the lilting breath of a lullaby—one that Makoto had often sung to the twins as they lay with Hayato in their cradles, high and sweet as a maiden’s prayer as Haru drew close to his son and clasped his hand like a lifeline.

* * *

By and by the skies were stilled at last, though from what the steward had seen he knew the storm might have endured for three hours more at least. The traders could scarcely stir themselves enough to rise, for their muscles were cramped and weary after crouching so long in the sand, and as they lifted their veils they found that night had fallen—clear and blue as if nothing had passed below it, and bright as a jewel with the gleam of the pallid stars. Rei got to his feet and brushed the grit from his robe, sighing in despair at the earth caked round his collar before he pulled Nagisa upright and turned his attention to his master. Haru lay slumped against Raiha’s neck, his face hidden in the saddle as Rei knelt beside him and set a hand on his shoulder.

An instant later the steward withdrew with a cry, for the palm that had touched his brother’s sleeve was crimson from knuckle to heel. Nagisa gaped at the sight, and tore open the prince’s pack for a healer’s kit as Rei took hold of the dagger at Haru’s waist and cut away the cloth from his arm.

The wound was deeper than they had thought, and wider across than Nagisa’s knee. The left side of Haru’s tunic was stiff with dirt and clotted blood, and a fresh coat of scarlet brimmed down from the weeping rent in his chemise like the wealth of a mountain stream. It was a minute or more before Rei understood that Haru had long ago passed beyond hearing, for he had lost more than a man could bear—and quickened by the heat of the storm his blood had flowed the faster, until the prince succumbed to a heavy sleep from which they could scarcely wake him.

“Make camp, and build up a fire!” barked Rei, turning to the soldier behind him as he steadied his master in his arms. “We can go no further to-night, not with him so—bring me the kit, Nagisa—”

The guardsmen hastened to obey him, digging a shallow pit in the sand and lining it with dung and kindling before setting the fuel ablaze and filling a kettle to boil. The tent the three boys had shared was unfolded and raised into place by the flames, and once a bed was made up for the prince within they laid him on a mattress and stripped off his tunic so the steward might work unhindered.

After the water was heated he cleaned the hurt with a siphon, soaking the wound until proof of the storm had gone from Haru’s flesh. As he brushed out the sand, Nagisa watched over the sinewy thread growing soft in the steam, warmed and lengthened by the rising clouds until Rei plunged a physician’s needle into the pot and held it there before lifting it out to cool and looping the string through its eye.

Haru stirred hardly a muscle as the row of stitches crept across his shoulder, for the steward wielded his needle and thread with all the skill of a seamstress as he drew them through the skin. At last the edges of the wound were drawn together so that the bleeding ceased, and once the last knot was finished he sat back on his haunches and sighed.

“There, it is done,” he said, passing a cloth over his forehead as he pulled off his overgown.

“Well done, Rei-chan,” whispered Nagisa, crouching down beside him and taking the bloodied fingers in his. “Will he—”

“He ought to sleep for as long as he can, and then he shall be as right as rain,” said Rei, grasping the dancer’s hands and kissing them before rinsing his own by the fire. “Wait for a moment, my love.”

He reached for the pack lying to his right, muttering under his breath as he dug between the tunics and trousers. It seemed to his betrothed that he sought a thing he did not hope to find, but at last he cried out in triumph and emerged with a gilded wineskin. It was embossed from top to bottom with the Iwatobian seal, and the stopper was cast in polished silver wrought in the shape of a falcon’s head. The vessel was finer even than the one that stood on Makoto’s altar, and the dancer cocked his head in question as Rei broke the seal at its neck.

“From whence did that come?” he asked, looking up in surprise as the insignia on the cap shone out in the golden light. It was a prayer-flask, for the liquor within was meant to fuel the lamps that burned by the Goddess’s feet at the morning worship—and fit for a sultan’s house, for even the seams at its base were covered in silver stitches.

“It was a gift from Haru’s father, when we left Iwatobi in the summer,” smiled Rei, tapping the coat of arms. “The seal is my own, and yours if you wish to claim it some day, _rouhiya_.”

Nagisa breathed a weary laugh, nodding at the older lad as he put the bottle to his lips and let a drop of wine roll out upon his tongue.

“Do you mean to drink it?” he said. “It is strong stuff, that—or at least it is so in Qasr, and surely enough to send you out of your wits.”

“Nay, it is not for me,” sighed the steward. “Haru will wake long before dawn from the pain, for though the wound was deep it was not as grave as we feared. There is better color in his flesh than I hoped, and a draught of liquor will calm the ache so he may sleep until morning. It has been aged these last eleven years—the last with the Queen’s mark, for among our folk it is custom that the wine brewed for worship in the palace is sealed by the monarch’s hand.”

“And Haru-chan’s father kept it all these years?”

“Aye, he did. He meant to give it to Haru, for his coming-of-age shall be this coming spring, but when we departed his lordship said that to him I had always been a son of his house, and that for having looked after the son of his flesh the right to the flask was mine.”

“I do not think there is a finer one in Qasr,” murmured Nagisa. “Swiftly, Rei-chan—let him drink, before he wakes.”

The Iwatobian did as he said, returning to his master’s side and rousing him long enough to persuade him to drain the bottle half-way. Haru swallowed the wine without a murmur of protest, and when the flask withdrew he shut his eyes and slept again in an instant.

Rei and Nagisa had their suppers by the tent, wrapped in a pair of quilts as the guardsmen tore between the dunes in search of a mottled serpent to roast over the coals. They went empty-handed for an hour or more, but at last one of the younger lads shrieked out in glee and ran back to the camp with a headless _afhiya_ slung around his neck. Nagisa laughed at the sight, and to his intended’s dismay he begged for a taste of the meat as it hissed on the flat-stone frying pan that the traders had brought from Qasr.

“You have eaten your fill, _amarya_ ,” he cried. “Come back at once—”

But Nagisa turned up his nose and bounced away to the bonfire with a grin, hovering behind the soldiers as they turned the white flesh on a stake. Rei shook his head and smiled in the dancer’s wake, curling deeper into the covers against the chill of the breeze.

As Rei kept watch, he saw that the shadows were pale beneath the prince’s lashes, as if the merriment ringing through the night had reached him in his dreams. The liquor had aided him well, for his slumber was sweet and sound, and as he lay on the blankets with Milad snoring beside him, he found that the world was whole again as it had not been for years.

“Sleep well, _shinainaru-ko_ ,” murmured Rei, kissing his brother’s brow. “The road has been long and hard, has it not? Nobody knows it better than I do, but perhaps after this the way will be smooth for us both.”

He rolled himself in a buckskin cloak and stumbled into the _khayma,_ closing his eyes upon the starlit evening as he lay. For a moment it seemed to him that some friendly presence was near, cool and clear as a woodland spring—and warm as the winds of summer, gentle and strong at once as it guided him on to his rest. He knew its touch, he thought—or else he recalled the fair hand from his childhood, smoothing away his fears on the first morning he took his place by the princes’ thrones.

“Thank you,” he breathed—half-asleep already, blind and deaf to the soul standing by to hear him. “You remained with us, then, all this time!”

_In life and in death, my son._

With that the weariness stole over his limbs, and the steward was lost to the spell of the night as his lashes fluttered down to his cheek like a pair of gulls alighting on the shore. He knew nothing more until Nagisa crept into the tent beside him, but as he dreamed he felt that his heart was healed, as if all the wounds of his youth had been mended at last.

* * *

When Haru came to he found himself alone, lying on his side in a bed draped all in white. He put a hand to the wound in his shoulder and drew it away again, wondering perhaps if Rei had given him a tonic for pain—

But the skin was clean and fair, and glancing down at his body he saw that his flesh was as clear as a new-born child’s—without so much as the faintest blemish, even down his trunk where he was thrown against the barrier in the jousting field. The callouses were gone from his palms, and the fencing scars on his hands and wrists had melted into the ether; all the proof of his nineteen years under Heaven was lost, and as he looked into the emptiness for Rei and Milad he knew what must have befallen him.

He closed his eyes and thought of the last he recalled—of kneeling with Nagisa and Rei in the _khamsin_ , and the darkness that stole over his eyes as the dunes fell away from beneath him. They were lost to him now, all three of them—Rei who sprang to his aid with a lance too heavy to lift, who walked beside him in the silence and bore Haru’s grief as his own, and Nagisa who shook him from sorrow long enough for the prince to be slain in his brother’s defense—

At once he glimpsed dark lashes on dimpled cheeks and a smile as dear as the soul behind it, sweet as a bloom with teeth as white as pearls. Haru pressed his hands to his breast and wondered at the pain, for though his death had been for their sakes he felt as if he was bereaved—and not the child at all, for as he grew small Milad would forget his face, as he had so nearly forgotten the mother who loved him more than life. It would be no loss to him, to have his father gone, but to Haru himself the blow was too sharp to bear, and he sank back to the mattress in tears.

“It is no matter!” he cried, striking one palm with the other. “He lives, I know, and Rei is alive, with the joy of his days in his arms! How long you called in the darkness, shouting my name to the dunes! Trouble them no longer, at least, for here I am at your doorstep without a weapon to guard me—do as you will, my Lord!”

“I did not know this realm had a lord at all, _shin’ainaru-ko._ ”

A gasp tore from his lungs—lungs that thirsted for air as if he still drew breath, and whirling on his heel he saw a woman standing alone in the mist, clad in a robe as blue as the knots of lover’s grace with which his friend had adorned him—less than a fortnight ago, and still the days seemed as long as an age to him.

She was young, he thought, and yet it was not so—for her hair was as dark as a twilit spring, and silver as the diamonds that shone between the blossoms that night, warmed by Makoto’s touch as he wove the buds through the filigree that hung over Haru’s brow. It was as if he looked upon a girl and a woman at once, fresh as an icy brook in the sun and warm as a hearth in winter.

“Am I so changed that you do not know me, my heart?”

The laughter poured forth from her lips like the might of the rains that denied her—steady and strong in its path, and lovely as it had been in life—fair as it was in the treasured days of Haruka’s childhood, without a touch of melancholy to taint it as she drew him into her arms.

“Grandmother?” he asked, bewildered that though he stood but three inches shorter than Rei his head came no higher than her girdle, and his hands were small and fine in hers as she kissed his dimpled cheek.

“Aye, in the flesh,” she said. “You ought not to fret for your son, my lad—for you shall see him again, and raise the child to manhood as you were always meant to do.”

He stood and stared as if he looked upon a ghost, and perhaps he did; but there was nothing of the dead about her. Nor about him, he found, for he was in the shape of a lad of six again—as he felt himself to be, light and unharried as he had not been since the summer his youth was stripped away from him.

“Oh, my foolish little flower,” she murmured, kissing his brow and lifting him up to her lap as she sat on the bed beside him. “What was it, to die as I did? Such a life as I lived, sweetheart! a fine one and a long one, and greater by far than the songs they put to my name! The last I knew was a prayer that the Goddess would guard you, sweetheart, but how it wrung my heart to leave you—I had yet to see the men all three of you would grow to be, and it was a heavy sorrow to be parted from all whom I loved.”

“What ought I to do?”

“Return, my love, for you are not yet slain,” said Suhaila, running a finger through his raven hair. “Live as I lived, my blossom, and do not seek to perish in my wake—all these years I have watched you, and it grieved me sorely to find that you were scarcely among the living at all. It is the lot of men, to suffer, and yours has been harder than most—but you _shall_ endure, my prince, for you are made of sterner stuff than you know.”

He scarcely knew how long he passed with her, only that her solemn words gave way to laughter, setting his own afire like a charm as they sat together as they used to do in his nursery long ago. By and by his heart was lightened until his burdens were gone, and the chains of his past were melted away as if they had never bound him at all.

* * *

So it was that the nights drew on, and day by day the caravan drew nearer to its harbor. They came to the Iwatobi on the sixteenth day, still and quiet and calm as they had left it so long ago. It was a four hours’ ride before the walls of Sahrastan rose up before them, strong and sure as they had always been—and just as surely home, for no matter where they hung their cloaks the West would hold their hearts, and the lads knew it as surely as they knew the touch of one another’s hands.

They clung to each other and wept at the sight, for over the sandstone parapet the flags flew high and proud on either side of the city gates. The banners snapped in the wind like a pair of scarlet flames, bearing the likeness of an inky dragon curled on a crimson ground with three black stars glinting above its brow.

Though the lengthening nights had drained the warmth from the East, the desert burned with all its fire in the West—harsh and keen as it was when they parted from home in the summer, piercing their linen slippers as if they wore nothing at all. Haru laughed and filled his lungs with the blistering air, shouting for joy when he found it unchanged from the breaths he knew of old—clean and fierce and bright as the day, despite the waxing moon that hung like a lantern above them. Rei and Haru kept their veils across their faces as the camels walked on through the streets, hoping against hope to reach the palace unseen. They were stopped at the barrier, as they had known they would be, but the moment Haru’s hood fell back to his shoulders the portcullis was lifted at once.

They sprang from their saddles and rolled down to the marble path, hardly daring to breathe as they lifted their heads and gazed upon the palace in all its beauty afresh. The bulwarks gleamed like a wall of mirrors in the starlight, and on the stone by their feet the lads saw their own faces reflected side-by-side—violet and blue glinting up to the skies like a beacon to herald their coming.

Nagisa slipped to the ground behind them, holding small Milad to his chest as Haru and Rei cast off their veils and took to their heels, running past the double line of guardsmen to the flight of stairs at the western end of the terrace. It seemed that the teakwood doors had opened well before either of the two were near enough to touch them, flung wide to the night from within, and without the power of the sentries on the landing to aid them. The shaft of light beyond grew deep and warm as the panels swung back on their hinges, pouring the glow of a thousand torches out into the darkness like a flood of glistening mead.

A man stood alone in the threshold, and for the brillance behind him they could scarcely make out the gleam of his eyes, shining down towards them as they had always been wont to do, kind as a hill in the springtime and wholesome and fresh as a flower. They were shuttered again for an instant, as his lashes swept down to his cheek—and then he was running, down the steps towards them until he was close enough to brush their faces.

Haru gasped out a sob and crumpled across the floor with Rei behind him, caring nothing for the stone beneath his feet. They would have fallen, the both of them, but before their knees could break on the marble they found themselves in a pair of beloved arms—well-muscled and strong, hardy of muscle and sinew and bone, and yet they shook with their keeper’s tears as Haru’s head came to rest on his cousin’s shoulder. Beside him the steward had turned his face into Aki’s neck, sniffling against his collar until Aki choked and began to cry.

“Haru,” sobbed Aki, kissing the pallid brow again and again before turning his lips to Rei’s. He shook like a leaf as he strained them to his heart, tightening his arms around them as if to assure himself that he had them in his grasp again, living and breathing and near as they had not been for the past six moons. “ _Shin’ainaru-ko_ —oh, my darlings—”

They scarcely knew how long they sat there on the tiles, holding one another close until the tears gave way to joy, dried by three pairs of loving hands as sobs gave way to laughter. Aki kissed them once again and rose to his feet, looking down at the slender boy standing shyly at the foot of the stairs with a black-haired bundle sleeping in his arms.

Rei and Haru stood aside and glanced at his back in wonder as he passed, skimming lightly down the steps until he stood before the dancer with all the tender welcome of the world shining in his eyes.

“ _Okaeri,_ little brother,” he said, clasping Nagisa’s palm in his.

With that the younger boy was lost, weeping louder even than Haru had done as he cast himself upon Aki’s shoulder.

“ _Tadaima_ ,” sobbed Nagisa, squashing small Milad until he awoke and joined in the chorus with a wail of his own.

They went into the palace hand-in-hand, where the three travelers were welcomed with embraces enough to content them for a life’s worth of days. Over supper that evening Haru sat in his place at his cousin’s side, gazing upon the folk he loved with his heart in his eyes and scarcely keeping the tears from his lashes as the merriment waxed thick and fine down the table.

And yet—and yet it seemed that his Heaven was not complete, as if some gentle presence ought to have lingered beside him, but surrounded as he was by the warmth of his parents’ joy he could not place it. _I shall think upon it tomorrow_ , came the drowsy thought, wafted from the brink of his dreams as he rested on Aki’s arm. _Tomorrow—_

But the call of slumber was far too strong to resist, and the next moment he fell asleep on Nagisa’s lap as the revelry sang on about him.

  
  



	15. Jewel of the East Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Makoto learns anger, and Rin finally gets a clue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM SO SORRY FOR THIS LATE UPDATE. Chapter 15 was originally over 21k words (hence the month since I last updated) focusing on both Makoto in Qasr and Haru in Iwatobi, but I couldn't pay enough attention to either of them, so I cut it in half where Makoto's POV ended. This means we don't get an illustration this chapter (it belonged to the second half of 15, which will now go into 16) but also that the next update will be relatively soon!! Sorry again for the long wait, and hope you enjoy!! :)

_The first he saw was a flood of sunlight, pouring past his lashes and blinding him with its brilliance; or so it seemed, for an instant later he found that it was an hour or two past midday, and dim with a blanket of golden clouds shining away to the west._

_He blinked up at the heavens and sprang back in alarm, for to the east they lay in shadow, and Makoto himself was alone in the midst of a barren wasteland. He could not move, for his feet were rooted to the ground, but behind him he heard a chorus of strangled screams and the cry of steel on steel: sounds he had known twice or three times a year, when the sandmen strayed too near to the Qasrian border—and the last he had caught that day two moons ago, stricken from the saddle by a jagged spear in his side._

_A body lay in the dust before him, sprawled on its face with sand in its hair and a spreading bloodstain on the earth beneath it. Makoto shivered and made to lay a hand on the drooping shoulder to see if the man still lived, and to his astonishment he moved without hindrance. He could not tell from whence the blood had come, for the left side of the cream-colored tunic had been washed with crimson, and the strands by the slender neck were pale with the powdery soil. The prince knelt down beside the fallen soldier, only to be stopped in his tracks at the sight of the grimy jewels on his hand: darkened to purple with the wealth of his veins where once they were blue as the sky, and familiar to Makoto as the lines of his own sigil—_

_“Haru!” he screamed, lunging forward to take his friend in his arms. “Haru-chan!”_

_But he did not stir, and as he was drawn from his dreams once again it seemed as if Rei was calling his master’s name, howling into the silence as Haruka slumbered on without breath, as pale and listless as the dead._

* * *

“Why did you not come with me to the shrine before breakfast, Makoto?”

He opened his eyes on the gilded bedchamber and found his advisor standing by the foot of the mattress, gazing upon his liege with anger and pity brewing like poison in his eyes. The younger lad was dressed from head to foot in white with a hemlock leaf on his breast, and with a pang the prince recalled that the seventh day of Kanun al-Adar was the day given for mourning in the custom of Sardahan. Twelve years had come and gone since Lord Matsuoka’ death, but still each winter his wife donned the colors of grief, and so did his son and daughter, though Gou could scarcely remember him.

“You were meant to join me for my prayers with Mother,” murmured Rin. “I did not think you would forget them, but I suppose it couldn’t be helped.”

The fire in his gaze went out as if slain by a breath of wind, and he sat beside the prince and put his chin on his knees. Makoto pushed back the covers and patted the spot by his left, taking the white hands in his as Rin heaved a sigh and looked down at his feet.

“How do you fare?” he asked quietly. “Haru was dearer to you than to the rest of us put together, I know, and it was you that found him in his bath—”

“Do not speak of it,” said Makoto, touching his fingers to the teakwood nightstand for luck. “Even now it haunts me, that he is safer with the traders than he ever was in our halls.”

“Have you dreamed again of late, then?”

After Haru’s departure Makoto had only spoken of his nightmares to Rin, and more often than he had voiced them to his mother, for he had feared to trouble her. Haru himself had thought there was nothing in them, so sure of his own vitality that he laughed and soothed the Qasrian back to sleep with a kiss, while the queen’s own visions would show her nothing to make matters clear to them both.

“Aye, I did,” he sighed. “First I stood by his grave, and then I wore hemlock to mourn him, and last night I saw him killed upon his journey.”

“They cannot all be true, Makoto,” opined the advisor. “If he were slain upon his journey he would never have rested in the East, and surely if he had perished Ran would have worn mourning for him as well as you.”

“That is so,” said the prince, running his nails through his hair and bounding up from his place. “We are to meet with Sei and Father at the ninth bell, are we not? Who else shall be present?”

“The Queen, and Seijurou’s second-in-command,” came the answer, broken by a yawn as Rin buried his face in the blankets. “The council has not heard our suspicions, save Lord Shigino and his wife.”

“Perhaps it is for the better,” muttered Makoto, unlacing his tunic and stalking away to the washroom to draw himself a bath. “Such a frail excuse as we gave to the court, to say why Haru has gone. As if the Suhrians would ever believe that Mother feared the sandmen would attack his caravan, and sent him away by night!”

“They would not believe it of a Queen,” Rin pointed out. “But they would believe it of a mother whose child was nearly slain by the brutes, and her love for you and the little ones is known throughout the kingdom. Swiftly, Makoto! I will not have you go to your father without your breakfast, and already you have lain abed too long.”

The prince replied with a hasty nod and hurried him out of the chamber, returning within for his bath as Rin went down to the kitchens to gather a tray for his friend. He made the sign of the Goddess’s lamp on his breast before slipping round the door, lest he should find the kindly cook in an evil temper again. Azar greeted him by the baking tables with a face as wrathful as his own had been earlier in the day, and it was a minute or longer before she consented to fill a basket with meats and cheese for the prince.

“Take this black loaf, then, and a flagon of mead,” she grumbled, tucking the lump of bread into a kerchief with a bottle of golden liquor. “The boy will starve himself into the catacombs with his worry, and you—today is _huznal’ihad,_ is it not? Have you broken your fast?”

Rin shook his head and nearly fell to the floor an instant later as she cuffed him round the ears.

“It is past the eighth bell, and you honored his Lordship at the sixth,” frowned Azar, heaping a bowlful of oatcakes into the basket with the mutton. “Go up and eat with Makoto, and see that he downs it all. He was ill scarcely a month and a half ago, and still he is as thin as a reed.”

She turned back to her kettle as Rin bowed and took his leave, swinging the flagon by its jacket as he bounded up the stairs to Makoto’s chamber. He sighed as he swept over the threshold, for he had scarcely entered the prince’s rooms after the betrothal night so long ago—for Makoto had passed his hours of leisure with Haru from the day of the Iwatobian’s arrival, and once Milad was brought to the palace the advisor knew to seek his friend in Haru’s apartments rather than his own.

Makoto glanced up from the study as Rin shut the door in his wake, shaking a mist of water from his hair before crossing into the parlor and sitting at the sketching-table opposite the younger lad.

“You shall finish every last bite of this, Makoto,” vowed Rin, emptying the basket between their plates. “Or Azar will have my head, and Kisumi shall replace me as counsel.”

The prince nodded and poured out the flask of mead, wrinkling his nose at the film it left in his goblet.

“Mead for the morning meal?” he asked, spluttering into a cloth as the draft blazed down his throat. “Did you take it from the cellar, Rin?”

“As if Azar would have given me leave to depart alive, if I had,” growled the advisor. “Nay, she sent it for you. You have been roaming the halls like a spectre since Haru’s departure, and everybody from his Majesty to the servants knows it. It will do him no good, to starve yourself into the grave with your fretting, and you need not waste away like a dying man for want of him.”

Makoto shivered and dropped his knife, staring down at his platter as Rin muttered an oath and bit his tongue for his foolishness.

“Only twenty-one days, and then there will surely be a letter from him,” he said, prodding the prince’s arm with his spoon. “They traveled with forty guardsmen, Makoto. What could have befallen him, and so far from our borders? The sandmen do not go that way, and you know it as well as I. I will not have you worry until word comes back from the west, but word _will_ come, and then in Subat he will be by your side again.”

“Subat is seven moons away,” whispered Makoto. “Five months he spent beside me, and now I scarcely recall my days without him.”

“There is nothing you can do for that,” sighed Rin. “It has grieved us all to lose him, and Nagisa and Rei—they will make their home here some day, but Haru shall never remain so long in the east again. He was meant to go in Shahad, you remember, and if not for your wound he would have returned to Iwatobi long ago.”

They did not speak again as they emptied their plates, leaving the dishes for the servants to clear before donning their overgowns and passing up through the corridor behind the icy hearth to the sultan’s chamber. It was empty, but from the adjoining room they heard the murmuring of the general and the Queen, followed by Lord Shigino’s gentle voice.

“I am sorry, my Lord,” said Rin, bowing to Masoto as they let themselves into the study. “We did not mean to keep you waiting.”

“It is no matter, child,” soothed the king, indicating the empty chair at his left. “Sit beside me, my son, and you by Lord Shigino, Rin.”

Once they had taken their places the conference began, upon the subject that had beleaguered them since the night Haru fled the citadel with Rei—the question of the Suhrians, and how they might sway the Qasrian court to bring the rogues to trial. They spoke for an hour or more, making note after note for their allies in the council, until at last Natsuko rose from the bench and went to gaze out of the window.

“What is the matter, my love?” asked the sultan, turning round to face her. She lifted her slender brows and stared down into the courtyard, where three of the champions from Marmayah were amusing a band of children who had ventured up from the town to play in the palace gardens.

“You recall what Gou found in the stables, do you not?”

“Aye, the burn on the underside of Haru’s saddle,” said her husband. “What of it?”

“The Suhrians must know that the _ahen_ was found in his meal, else we would not have sent him away. And they will be frightened out of their wits, for they cannot leave the citadel lest they be unmasked for treason.”

“Aye, that is so,” replied the sultan, furrowing his brow.

“Reason knows nothing in the face of fear, my heart,” she said, fastening the clasp of her mantle as she departed the chamber. “Makoto, Seijurou—come with me, for your men are expecting us in the practice ring.”

Rin shot a questioning look at his brother-in-law, who shook his head in confusion and followed the queen from the room with Makoto at his heels.

* * *

“Of all the spots to hide myself, I would not have chosen a hayloft,” snorted Rin, growling into the darkness as Seijurou hit him over the head.

“You ought not to be here, Rin,” said the General, looking over the wooden stiles to the floor below. “You have never touched so much as a dagger—little Ren could better hold his own in a fight, and you know it.”

“He wished to see his Highness avenged as dearly as you did, my Lord,” whispered Rayan, touching the broadsword at his girdle. “But if the devils come hither tonight there shall be only a handful, and no cause for a fight at all.”

“One cannot be sure,” grumbled Sei, looking anxiously at the younger lad. “And then you, Makoto! you have not lifted a sword since before you were ill, and yet you quarrelled with me until your father let you go with a practice blade.”

“You are not yet strong enough for a scimitar?” hissed Rin. “Makoto, you fool!”

“Aye, he dropped it into the dust after bearing it aloft for only a minute,” said Seijurou. “To come here thus, with such a poor weapon as that—you would have bound me hand and foot to keep me from going, if you were in my place!”

“Hush,” breathed Makoto, staring into the shadows. His green eyes burned in the gloom like a pair of emerald flames, and there was no hint of fear within them: only an icy chill, like the calm of a hunting viper. “I wish to look the brutes in the face and strike them myself if I may, but by law I cannot touch them if they yield, and for all my weakness you shall have your work laid out to restrain me then,.”

Seijurou gaped at his liege, while Rayan shook his head in understanding.

“A crime against him is a crime against me,” mumured the prince. “I would fight on his behalf to the death, as he would for mine.”

They fell silent and looked across to the opposite loft, where six of the general’s best from the infantry were packed together like fish in a barrel. A third company lay in wait twenty paces down the room, close by the southern door to the stables.

All that day word had flown round the palace of Haru’s fall from Nafisa’s back during the tournament a fortnight previously, and his absence for the past three days. Natsuko’s ladies-in-waiting had begun the rumors, slipping from chamber to chamber and leaving a trail of worried gossip in their wake. Rayan and young Sanim from the guard had dined with a pair of Haifans at noon, and from there the whispers had traveled amongst all the folk who had journeyed to Sardahan from the provinces two weeks earlier—that one of the visiting delegations had sought to murder the prince, and by so doing sever the alliance between Qasr and Iwatobi.

Makoto himself had seen the kitchen-maids pulling at the strings of Azar’s apron, demanding if a sleeping draught had found its way into their dishes so the prince might drown in his bath. By the early evening he brought back the message to his mother with Seijurou and Rin, kneeling by her feet as she brushed the top of his head with a steely glint in her eye.

“Well done, my sons,” she sighed, giving them leave to rise. “The Suhrians will not sleep to-night, now that they have heard of our knowledge.”

“Will they come to fetch the saddle, then?” asked Rin, brushing the dust from his trousers. “We were careful to say that Nafisa had been lamed before the match, and threw Haru from the saddle for the pain.”

“Aye, they will,” said the Queen, “And there is naught that will save them, if they are found there.”

Rin set his jaw and wondered at the look that had stolen over Natsuko’s face, that her ire could be no greater if even her own children had come so near to death that day. He squinted into the shadows again, recalling the promise Masoto had given his son-in-law five moons ago, in the summer: that he would be as a father to him, if only he swore to honor Ran as the priceless treasure she was.

Haru was more than friend to them all, he thought. In the weeks he passed with the Qasrians his heart had filled a recess that had always lain among them, and so had Rei and little Milad. The prince was dear as brother to Hayato and the twins, and perhaps to Rin as well.

And to Makoto—

_I cannot say what he was to him._

* * *

The guards had waited in the loft for an hour or more when a ray of yellow light crept over the straw on the ground, dancing like a candle’s flame as the stable doors swung inward together. Seijurou caught his breath and poked Makoto in the ribs, pointing down to the pair of men who crept over the threshold with a gunny-sack large enough for a child to hide in. The taller of the two held a lantern aloft, scanning the saddles hanging between the windows for the gaudy affair of red and gold that had been Haru’s for the tournament.

“Where is it?” he hissed, lifting the lamp above his head to spread the beams as far as he might.

“Between those two stalls, there,” said the other. He shut the doors in his wake and went toward the west wall where Haru’s saddle glinted in the candlelight, hanging on the hook beside Makoto’s. A rough hand loomed out of the darkness and took the saddle down from its perch, dropping it into the burlap bag before the rogues blew out the light and turned to flee.

“Swiftly, now,” breathed the general, nodding at the soldiers crouching below the rafters across from them. Rin shrank back against a bale of hay as the three men vaulted over the railing and into the aisle below, landing on their feet like a group of cats leaping down from a height. All around them the others had done the same, dropping to the floor around the two cloaked figures standing frozen in the center of the room.

The advisor covered his ears and hid his face in his knees, for despite his bluster he could not bear the sight of blood or hear a cry of pain, regardless of the treachery of the men in the ring beneath him. He scarcely knew how long he sat crouching there, only that Seijurou held fast to Makoto’s arm all the while, and that the Suhrians dared not fight against the soldiers, for they were outnumbered eight to one and all hope of escape was beyond them.

At last Rayan returned to the loft and laid a hand on his shoulder, chuckling under his breath at Rin’s white face as the younger lad took a swipe at his head. When he returned to his own chambers a quarter of an hour later he heard from Sakura that the Queen had woken the council, and received their promise to bring the two Suhrians to trial along with their liege, Masuda.

He did not see Makoto again until the following morning, and nearly laughed for joy when he saw the relief in the prince’s eyes, relief that he had honored the absent Iwatobian as Haru would have done in his place—-that the ones who dared to touch their friend had been brought to justice, and their power in the East broken for ever by the betrayal.

* * *

The next day Makoto arose with his will returned to his limbs, and strength in his blood as there had not been since the night of Haru’s departure. He sprang from his bed and readied himself in the washroom, scrubbing his body from head to foot before donning his jacket and robes. Once he was dressed he went through the door that led to the children’s schoolroom beyond, rustling over the carpet like a gust of wind as he went to wake the twins.

“Arise, _radhiy_ ,” he sang, shaking Ren from slumber. “It is already the ninth bell, and the three of you have slept too long.”

Ren’s dark eyes peered over the blanket like an owl’s, blinking up at Makoto in wonder. The little lad had not seen his brother so lively for a week, and at the sound of his laughter the small prince leapt out from under the covers and went to clean his teeth by the basin with Ran.

Makoto breakfasted with the little ones that morning, and there was merriment at the table as they had scarcely known since Haru fell from Nafisa’s back during the tournament. The children were loath to part from him when Gou arrived for their lessons, and refused to let him stir from the room until they had covered his face with a storm of kisses.

“Let me go, sweetheart,” he smiled, brushing the top of Ran’s head as he turned towards the door. Hayato leapt off his chair and threw his arms round Makoto’s waist, clinging like a crab as Gou lifted her eyes to the ceiling as if in a plea for patience.

“Can’t you give us our lessons too, Onii-chan?” begged Ran. “Then we’d go out to the gardens twice as quickly.”

“Nay, I cannot,” chuckled her brother. “Nothing would please me better than to stay all day with the three of you, but it has been more than a month since I left the guard. I will grow soft if I remain away much longer, and it is time the regiment had their captain back again.”

With that he bid them farewell and set off for the practice ring, where the soldiers welcomed him with a flood of gleeful cries. Seijurou spent nearly a quarter of an hour shouting in vain through the armory, for the men were taking it in turns to shake their liege by the hand and beat him on the back for joy. For a while nothing could be heard save a thunder of applause through the vaulted chamber, and a string of whistles from a pair of lads who had climbed up to sit on the windowsill.

“Enough!” bellowed the general, losing his temper at last. “To the ring, my men, before I take leave of my senses and keep you until the evening!”

They grinned at his fury as they had never dared to do before, pulling the prince out to the arena where they began their sparring with redoubled energy. Rayan claimed Makoto as his partner for the first bout, and as they danced through the sand with the glint of their blades between them it seemed as if life had returned to the soldiers anew.

* * *

“Aye, now— _parry!”_

Three hours had passed since the guards commmenced their training, and all save the youngest of the lot had gone for their dinners long ago. The children in the ring were squires and sentries, all between twelve and sixteen with little knowledge of a sword. Makoto and Seijurou had remained behind to teach them, along with Rayan and a slender lad called Salya, a gangling youth of twenty who had entered the ranks earlier that month. The prince had taken the smallest of the boys to practice with, showing the child how to balance his weapon without stumbling and keep his fingers clear of the pommel.

“The further behind you grip the sword, the heavier it will be,” he explained, correcting the poise of the little shoulder. “Now follow my steps, Arjuna, and do not fear; go slowly, and take care not to lose your hold.”

Makoto lifted his sword and lunged at the little sentry, nodding in approval as the practice blade rose up to block his own weapon.

“Mind your left leg, _jundiin_ ,” he called, darting away again. “You should not lean upon either foot, or you will surely fall.”

“Aye,” cried Arjuna, “Is this better, Highness?”

Upon receiving a smile of approval from his liege the child took a moment to cut a caper before flinging himself back into battle, dancing round Makoto’s knee like an excitable pup as he swung his blade. Makoto laughed and warned him to keep the weapon high, and once the small boy was spent the prince sent him on to the water-jug and looked at the stands for his second pupil.

“Go to your lord, Indira,” said Seijurou, taking Arjuna’s abandoned sword and giving it to a dark-haired girl hovering by the gate to the ring. Makoto nodded and beckoned her through, and so the afternoon passed by in a flurry of fencing and laughter.  

They had come to the eldest of the lads when a shout rang out in the hall, echoing down the passage as it drew nearer to the heavy doors. Seijurou stopped in his tracks and shouted to the wardens beside them, who sprang to attention and admitted a panting messenger into the stands.

“You are needed in court, Prince Makoto,” he gasped, putting his hands on his knees to steady himself. “There was trouble at the border, and the Queen has called for you and General Mikoshiba both.”

Makoto frowned and passed his blade to a serving-boy, motioning Seijurou to follow him to the armory. There they cast off their sweat-stained gowns and pulled on a pair of fresh tunics, splashing their faces and arms with water before running down the passage and up the stairs to the councilchamber on the second floor. Sei glanced about in confusion at the guards, for they had no place in court, and yet it looked as if half the wardens from the city gates were pressed between the door and the dais where Masoto sat with his Queen. Makoto and Seijurou stood on tiptoe and squinted over the sea of heads, wondering what the men were doing there until the sultan caught sight of his son and called his name through the bedlam.  

“Makoto!” he shouted, waving desperately from behind his wife. “Come—”

The prince lifted the skirts of his gown to keep himself from stumbling, taking Seijurou by the arm as they fought their way through the crowd. Once they had reached the center of the room they saw that a line of guards stood by the plinth with a group of prisoners: a band of haggard men dressed all in white and grey, kneeling before their captors with their faces turned to the ground. Their hands and brows were dark from a lifetime beneath the suns, browner by far than the skins of the guards who held them. Seijurou’s mouth twisted up in a frown as he gazed at their tattered coats, lifting his eyes to the sultan in question.

“Brigands,” muttered Sanim, who was standing behind them. “They rode up to the city gates nearly an hour ago.”

“Did they mean to gain entrance, then?” asked the prince. “And their horses—what became of them?”

“Not horses,” said the younger man, shaking his head. “Camels, my lord.”

“Camels?” inquired Sei, disbelief plain as day in his voice.

“Aye, they came from further west than we had thought,” said the guard. “Their beasts were with them, and we tied them just beyond the walls after we took the men into our keeping.”

“Were any of your company hurt?” inquired Makoto.

Sanim laughed under his breath and tipped his chin at his comrades, who wore identical looks of bemusement as they stood above their charges.

“They surrendered themselves without a word, Highness.”

Seijurou’s jaw dropped open, and he muttered under his breath as he glared at the eldest of the bandits. He had not yet forgotten the deadly spear that so nearly pierced his flesh long ago—and still Makoto’s cries of agony haunted his dreams now and then, along with the sight of the bubbling blood that ran from the prince’s side when his friend threw himself in the weapon’s path to save his life. Makoto saw the flash in the golden eyes and gripped Seijurou’s shoulder to calm him, turning back to the plinth as he waited for his father to begin. By and by the crowd grew silent save for the whispering sentries at the door, and Masoto rose to his feet at last to address the assembly together.

“You came to our doors seeking passage into the city, _shar’ihada_ , when you and all your kin have been banned from the five kingdoms for time out of mind,” he said slowly, leveling a stern look on the seven prisoners. “And you wish for an audience before you are thrown in the gaols—you who have ever been a scourge on the honest folk of this land, preying on innocent travellers wherever you may!”

The brigands dared not glance up at his face, and the sultan stopped before the a grey-haired man with silver in his straggling beard before lifting his voice again.

“Speak!”

“Majesty,” whispered the brigand. “We dare ask no mercy for ourselves. We know that your justice is deserved, whatever it proves to be, but given the choice there is scarce a man who would plunder to eat unless he were driven to it.”

“My men would never do such,” answered the king, a spark of earthy fire stealing into his gaze. “I know it as I know my own heart. They would lay down their lives for any one of the five thousand souls in Sardahan, and it is blasphemy for a knave such as you to say it.”

“For themselves, perhaps,” came the sandman’s reply. “When it is their own lives—aye, we would do the same!”

“Your lot is no concern of ours,” said Masoto, his brows drawing low over his eyes. “I saw my own boy brought back from the desert scarcely two moons ago, pierced by a blade of your kinfolk’s making, and for a week and a fortnight after he lay in the grips of a fever until his body nearly burned to death from within! It is less than nothing to Qasr, _shar’ihad_ , your fate and  the fate of your people. You shall pass the your days in the prison cells or else be sold to the East—take them, Faizhan, for I have not the time for this to-day.”

The General’s second-in-command bowed his golden head to the king and took his charge by the wrist, pulling him up to his feet. The elderly brigand looked as if he would speak again, but the young man kneeling beside him was quicker. He twisted free of his captor’s grasp and plunged his fist into his robes, emerging a moment later with something small and bright clutched within it as if for dear life.

“We come with the favor of the lord who wore this ring,” he cried. “Three days past we found a caravan passing the great floodbed, a band of Northern traders with a guard, and six leagues away from the burning cliffs we made to take their goods. It would have been no worse than taking a fruit from a tree, for they were fenced between our lines and a sandstorm—but they rode forth to meet us though they were twice outnumbered, and our men fell to their swords like flies.”

Makoto froze to the tile and felt as if he would fall, for Haru’s caravan ought to have reached the floodbed three days ago. There had been no caravans bound for the far West since the week of the tournament, and none since the Iwatobian’s leaving. At once the bile shot up in his throat as he remembered the fear that had haunted his dreams of late: the jagged memory of Haru lying face-down in the sand, fallen over his gilded _kaskara_ with a bloodstain darkening his tunic from white to purple. It seemed that the same thought had risen to the sultan’s mind, for he clenched his teeth and curled his palms into fists as he turned to look at the brigand again.

“One of their number made to kill my son,” said the old bandit, lowering his eyes to the floor. “He had hold of the soldier’s friend, and to defend him he ripped the lad away and went to slit his throat.”

“If you spilled but a drop of Qasrian blood,” cried Faizhan, shaking his captive by the neck. “If but _one_ of their rank was harmed—”

“I begged the young lord for mercy and called my men to stand down, but he would not be swayed. He picked up his dagger again , and I could do nothing to stop him.”

“How is it that you are here, then?” spat Seijurou, moving to look the brigand in the face. “I cannot think they would let you go, once they had you in their grasp, nor that you would let them pass unhindered. Do not think to fool us, for we have fought your kind from the day the walls of this city were raised.”

“His brother bid him to let me go,” muttered the young man, sweeping back his hood to reveal a shallow cut beneath his chin. “And said that you would have mercy for our women and children at least, if you had none for us. The lad put down his blade and gave Father his ring as a sign of his favor. He said you would know it, and here it is.”

He opened his palm to reveal a circle of silver, and at the sight of it the sultan stopped in his tracks. Makoto blinked and stared at the spot of light with anguish growing in his blood, for he knew its owner could not have parted with the brigands unhurt—not when there was no wound on the brigand’s body save a cut no wider than a hair at his neck—

“They went forth from that place unharmed, Majesty,” whispered the elderly brigand. “I swear it.”

A moment later the windows rang like bells in their frames, and Seijurou clapped his hands over his ears in shock—for the bellow that tore from the prince's lips was the cry of a mourning beast, carried throughout the chamber as Makoto's body trembled from shoulder to knee like a blossom readied for its death. Before him the rafters dissolved into a haze of dingy fog, into which his friends were swallowed one by one until nothing remained but the hooded figure kneeling before the dais with the ring upturned on his palm. He knew its gleam as he knew the hand that had worn it, gentle and fair as it slumbered in his, and hardy and fierce on the hilt of a blade—smoothing the knots from his sister's hair with all the grace of a hymn, pressed to a tender mouth in the midst of a whispered prayer.

Haru had kept them polished, for by and by Ran had grown to love the sight of it winking over his palm, and to please her he touched the stones with water and soap as he readied himself for the day. But the glittering gem was dull and dark, spattered with dust and dirt along the band. The jewels seemed diminished in their settings, touched by a coating of earthy red, and he felt as if he would faint at the sight, for the grime that flowed between them had run through Haruka’s veins, crimson and fierce as a bonfire before it was drained from his body.

At once his dream of the night before last came back again like a phantom's knell, of Haru's tunic stained with blood and his fallen corpse in the sand, gripping a fencing-blade for dear life as he lay with his weapon beneath him. The trinket held fast to his gaze like a vice, for it had survived where its keeper had not, journeying through a wasteland for mile upon mile to bring him word of Haruka's passing.

He had never known rage in all his life, and yet it was nothing but fury that moved him, fury and grief so sharp in their power that he thought they would drive him to madness, for Haru was gone, _gone_ , _killed—_

And drive him they did, for he threw himself down the steps and took the young man by the throat, crushing its column between his hands as he screamed out into the darkness.

“Do not lie to me!” he roared, tightening his grip as the sunken flesh went purple under his palms. “A token of his favor? You dare come before me fresh from his murder, with the marks of his blood on your hands—better I tear you limb from limb to avenge him! He would never have relinquished my sister’s ring, never in all his days, unless you tore it from his fingers after you slaughtered him!”

“Makoto!” shouted the sultan, calling to Seijurou as he flew down the steps to the place where his son held the brigand in his deathly grasp. Together the two men contrived to wrestle the lad away, Seijurou retreating five paces backward as Masoto dragged his son up to the plinth.

“Turn me loose!” howled Makoto, struggling with all his might to break free. “Turn me loose, father, so I may rip out his miserable heart!”

“My son,” gasped the king, astounded as if a beast had bared its fangs where his gentle child had been. “ _Radhiy!_ ”

“Drop it!” screamed the prince, lunging forth again as Rin and Sakura bounded up to restrain him. Sakura fared better than both her husband and the king, for in a single movement she forced Makoto to his knees and drew his arms behind his back.  “Do not set your filthy fingers to it—the dust on which he trod is far too fine for the likes of a devil such as you!”

The brigand shrank away in fear and let the jewel slip down to the tile, and even if he had been free to depart he could not have stirred a muscle.

“He was unharmed, Highness, I swear it!” Rayan’s charge had lifted his voice, looking up at the throne in despair. “I know not why he chose his betrothal ring, and not the others he wore! But it was I who asked the sign from him, for I could not have read his writing, and nor could a single one among my clan!”

Makoto writhed until he had broken free of his father’s hands, rising to his feet and sweeping down to the floor as he plunged across the chamber and out into the corridor beyond. He snatched up the fallen ring as he passed, clutching it to his breast with a sob before the doors fell shut in his wake.

“Go after him, child,” whispered Masoto, pushing Rin in the direction his liege had gone. “I fear what he will do, angered as he is.”

The advisor bowed and raised the skirts of his gown, drawing them up to his knee so he might follow the prince unhindered. He flew between the councilmen and out to the passageway, turning left and right before he took to his heels and pelted towards the entrance hall and the great staircase that led up to the royal wing. From before him he heard a cry echoing out to the gardens, and muttering a prayer for luck he ran up two flights of steps and stumbled onto the prince’s landing.

Makoto’s door was shut, as was the one that led to Hayato’s rooms and the twins’, but Haru’s stood ajar, and the sound of the prince’s weeping drifted over the threshold as Rin set his jaw and went softly into the parlor. It was empty, as it had been for the past seven days, and a moment later he saw that his quarry was kneeling in the bedchamber where the two friends had slumbered together with Milad lying between them.

“Makoto?” he whispered, drawing near and setting a hand on the quaking shoulder. “I do not think they would have dared do such a thing, to come unarmed before the king after having murdered his daughter’s intended. It would be a fool’s errand, and surely only Haru himself could have persuaded them to make the journey.”

“I will go back and kill him, I swear it,” breathed the elder boy, pressing the bloodied gem to his lips. “If Haru suffered so much as a scratch, I shall slit the brigand’s throat and leave his corpse for the hounds. From the day I entered the cavalry I have laid his kin to waste, for they prey upon men like beasts and leave the poor souls to die of hunger and thirst, when they have not the mercy to run them through themselves!”

Rin fell silent and stared at the rising sinews in Makoto’s wrists, wondering how it was he had never noticed them before. Together they were enough to break a man’s neck, surely, and a chill crept down his spine at the sight of them, stirring in the prince’s flesh like a brace of angry serpents as if the fury had spilled from his heart to the very tips of his fingers. Makoto rose from the woven carpet and began to pace from wall to wall, cradling the betrothal ring to his heart as if he would never relinquish it again. Rin frowned and shook his head like a dog shaking water from its back, feeling as if he ought to know the passion that roiled in the prince’s breast—as if were not unknown to him, stranger though it seemed to be.

The advisor drew his overgown tightly about his body and hurried along in his friend’s wake, running to keep pace as Makoto’s long legs carried him this way and that across the chamber. Some new resolve had entered into the prince’s eyes, melding with fear and grief and fury until the four could no longer be told apart; and yet it softened the lines about his brow and mouth, gentling his voice as he kissed the ring once more and tucked it into his girdle.

“Suhar be damned,” he muttered. “And let the assembly shriek themselves hoarse, if it pleases them—I will ride for the West with the merchants of Sikandar two days hence, and there is no man living who would stop me.”

Rin halted in his tracks and stared, for second by second the truth unveiled its face: slow to begin with, and swifter than a storm when he recalled all that had passed between Haru and Makoto from the morning the younger lad arrived in the palace with Rei.

Makoto and Haru—how was it that he thought of them thus, each name inextricable from its fellow, whence a scant six moons ago the Qasrian prince had been whole in himself alone? Makoto and Haru slumbering together hand-in-hand when they had known one other for less than a fortnight, Makoto and Haru forsaking their duties to spend an hour at the bathing pools with Milad, Makoto and Haru vanishing into the darkness on the night of the Goddess’s festival, Makoto and Haru side-by-side in the sultan’s study, penning a stack of gilded cards to the provinces with their shoulders a hairsbreadth apart.

“Nay,” he gasped, feeling the color drain from his cheeks as he glanced at the door to the washroom, where he had seen the younger of the pair an inch from death and the elder working over his silent body to wrestle him back to life. It could not be, for both their sakes it could not, lest one or the other be ruined for his love.

Makoto’s mind had ever been clear to him; always the two had spent their days together, before Seijurou’s father became General, before Gou and Sakura were born. But the prince noticed nothing at all after Rin’s wedding to Sakura, as if he scarcely knew that his friend had not supped with him at luncheon for a month or more, and as he lay in the depths of his fever Makoto had not called him once—nor Sei, nor Gou, nor his parents. He only spoke of the children and the lad betrothed to his sister, the prince who had claimed his heart.

“No, Makoto,” begged Rin, catching his liege by the girdle and pulling him back to his side. “You—you, and Haru—”

He looked up into Makoto’s face and felt as if he would weep, for there was nothing beneath the deep-brown lashes to soothe him. The tender eyes were changed from the ones he had known, for where once they were mild and gentle as the sea he saw that a flame burned behind them—not of wrath, as Rin knew so well from his own reflection—

Makoto threw back his head and looked up at the vaulted ceiling as if to keep the tears from his cheek by force, but he did not speak again, and there the advisor found his reply. There was no one more precious to the Qasrian than the lad who had flown from their halls, and nothing to chill the warmth of the love that flourished in Makoto’s heart.

At once a nameless fear crept into Rin’s stomach, and he turned tail and ran from the room to the empty parlor. Makoto followed at a slower pace, frowning in question as Rin wrestled with the latch on the connecting door and sprinted into the prince’s apartments. He plowed through the disorder of the sitting room like a hind mowing tracks in a meadow, and once he reached at the threshold of Makoto’s bedroom he stood for a moment with his hand on the knob before turning the key and stepping into the chamber.

Makoto cried out and caught at the advisor’s sleeve as if keep his friend from going further, but Rin had passed beyond his reach, scrambling over the bed to the armoire on the far side and flinging back the doors as he threw an armful of silken tunics to the ground. It was hardly a moment before he found what he sought, and he shrieked with dismay as Makoto’s wooden rain-boots fell clattering onto the rug.

"What have you done?" whispered Rin, slumping to the floor with a perfumed sachet cradled in his palms. He gazed up at the prince with a question trembling on his lips, and to his astonishment Makoto did not turn away. There was not so much as a particle of shame on the Qasrian's face, and when he spoke his voice caressed the words as if he had sung his beloved up from the depths of the earth to stand before him.

"Only what I ought to have done the day we met," murmured Makoto, taking the square of velvet from his advisor's hands and pressing his lips to the golden seal. "He is the breath in my lungs, the joy of my days, and I would rather be slain than live without him."

"Makoto, you fool!" cried Rin, rising to his feet and running after the prince until he was near enough to pluck at his arm. "What would he think, to know you feel thus—he is promised to Ran! You would lose him for this?"

At once his friend's eyes were tranquil like the sea on a clear night, as if they had crossed the desert to seek the realm where Haru lay sleeping with Milad by his side.

"I will never lose him," he said, and stricken as he was Rin felt himself grow quiet at the promise. "He is all that I am, all that I wish, and I would move heaven and earth to keep him by my side."

"Would he do the same?" whispered Rin. "You are dear as brother to me, Makoto. I would rather slit my throat than see you grieve."

"It matters not," answered Makoto. "I belong to Haru as rays belong to the sun, and it matters not if he spurns my hand, for my heart shall be his while there is life in my body."

* * *

In later years Rin often laughed with Sakura over the tumult of the day, but the hapless advisor of the present could scarcely tell whether he stood on his head or his heels as the palace fell into bedlam about him. First there was Makoto nearly strangling a man and departing the court without so much as a backward glance, and then his discovery that the elder lad had grown to love the second son of the West with every thread of his being—and finally Makoto’s voice as he strode into the meeting chamber with Rin at his heels, shouting to all and sundry that he meant to ride for Iwatobi the following morning no matter what the council might think of his going.

More astounding still was the calm with which the Queen received him, rising from her place and quenching the angered outcry that sprang almost as one from the throats of the assembly. Rin nearly fainted dead away to see her challenge first the court and then her husband, shouting them down until their words were shaken into the silence at her feet.

“Your prince owes his life to Prince Haruka’s manservant,” cried Natsuko, glaring at the bearded men at the opposite end of the row. “And Makoto himself was one of the horsemen who spared Kaguya and the Princess from ruin! Has the friendship between peoples lost its worth in your eyes _?_ Hiromasa has but two heirs to his throne, his son and Prince Haru, and for the sake of his kingdom he trusted his brother’s child to your liege and to me! I swore to his mother to honor her lad as my own, and still my promise was not enough to keep him, for twice he was nearly slain in my halls and once before a crowd of thousands!

“The unrest in Suhar matters nothing, _jundiina._ Half their delegation has been proven false, and within the week his Majesty shall call on their viceroy to come to trial with his men. If need be their province shall be dissolved, and taken by Habar to the north—the folk of Habar doubted the marriage we sought for Ran, but there is no place in their court for treason! And so my son _shall_ ride for the West, for we are kin to Hiromasa now. Would you have us shamed for knaves, when Haru was wounded but three days’ ride from our borders? We cannot wait for word to come from Iwatobi, for if it were my son I would have gone the moment the brigands were brought before me!”

Rin sat back and rubbed his eyes, clutching at the arm of his chair to keep himself upright as the councilmen muttered among themselves. Natsuko did not stir from her place; instead she drew herself up to her full height and set her hand in Masoto’s, and at the sight of her blazing eyes the nobles knew their queen would not be swayed.

So it was that the advisor found himself running from room to room once the decision was made, dragging his father’s old saddlebags out of his mother’s chamber and flinging half his clothes onto the floor as he sought out the best for traveling. Beside him Sakura was dancing about in glee, with a riding-scarf on her head and a pair of _hidhas_ clutched in her hands as she spun.

“I do not see why I must go,” he grumbled, rooting beneath his robes for a pile of desert veils. “It is Makoto’s concern, and not mine.”

Sakura laughed and seized him by the waist, dropping her shawl to the ground as she caught his mouth in a kiss. He spluttered for a moment before falling into her arms, for try as he might he could not stand against Sakura’s gaiety. Her joy was fierce enough to soothe the worst of sorrows, and so he joined in her mirth as she waltzed him about the chamber, shouting her praises all the while.

* * *

_He no longer remembered how often the vision had come to plague him—but again he found himself in the feasting hall, sitting on a tufted footstool with an empty dish in his lap. He put the thing aside and rose to his feet with a sigh, watching the lords and ladies of the court as they went from the laden tables to the dining-rows on the eastern wall. Ren was standing by the window, greeting Lord Khais and his daughter with a rising flush in his cheeks._

_“Lord Ren!” cried the maiden, blushing like a rose as he bent to kiss her fingers. “We had not expected to see you back so soon.”_

_“Suhar was not nearly as contrary as my brother expected,” he laughed. “There was no need to remain another week, and so I took my pony and a handful of guards and ran back home again.”_

_“You did your duty honorably, Highness,” said the girl’s father, making Ren a short bow._

_“I thank you, Lord Khais,” answered Ren. “Will you accompany me to supper, Aina?”_

_“But of course. May I, father?”_

_They moved off together, and in the blink of an eye they were gone, lost among the laughing guests as Makoto looked away and searched through the crowd for Milad. He found the child a moment later, bounding between the revelers as if he went on springs before hurling himself into Makoto’s arms._

_“Papa!” cried the little lad, nuzzling into his father’s gown like a kitten._

_“Milad,” murmured Makoto, clinging fast to his son. He bent his head and listened as Milad whispered into his ear, mustering a grin at the glee in the boy’s voice._

_“Hashad said my name, Papa,” hissed the child, frisking as if he would fly. “All by his own self!”_

_Makoto lifted his brows in question, for he had never heard of a soul by that name in all his life. Milad laughed and pointed at the open doors to the balcony, kissing his father’s cheek before taking to his heels and running off through the gathering. The prince frowned and squinted after him—and nearly fell to the floor as he caught the gleam of a moonstone coronet, shining on the brow of a slender woman standing alone by the balustrade. He could see nothing but the back of her head and the curve of an alabaster cheek, as well as the face of the brown-haired baby fast asleep on her shoulder.  Milad sprang up onto her hip like a falcon seeking its perch, and despite the sleeping child in her arms she bent like a reed to receive him, holding the boy one-handed as she steadied the yawning baby, as if their bodies were kin enough to know the weight of the other._

_Makoto sighed as Milad peppered the lady’s face with a storm of kisses—a face the prince had not yet seen, as if the fates did not wish him to know the one who would be his wife. He thought with a pang of cropped black hair and eyes as blue as Heaven, clutching his heart as a wrenching pain burned through his breast at the sight._

_He made his way to the fringe of the crowd and seated himself on a chair, casting a doleful glance at the carven doors as they parted to let Ran and Hayato pass with Rei. He could not bear to see the hemlock at the steward’s collar again, and it was only with all the strength in his blood that he kept from taking the one at his breast and flinging it over the balcony._

_At last he heard Milad’s small voice again and looked up to see the child bobbing beside him, clutching a blackberry oatcake bitten off at the top. His hand was clasped in Momo’s, Momo who stood nearly as tall as his brother with some of the fire soothed in his eyes, though still they were bright with laughter as they had always been._

_“Uncle says he will take me to visit Mama’s grave, since you cannot,” said Milad, dropping his cake into Makoto’s lap. “Uncle Rei will walk with us—may we go, Father?”_

_“Aye, you may,” smiled the prince, bending forward to kiss his son on the brow. “Hold his hand all the while, radhiy, and mind your step on the stairs.”_

_“I always do,” chirped the little lad, frisking like a colt as Momo swung him up to his shoulders. “Onward, Uncle! It is Mama’s birthday to-day, and Aunt Azar promised to give me lavender for a present.”_

_With that they danced away as if they went on springs, dragging the steward behind them as they set off on their errand. Makoto was left to himself in the feasting-hall, gazing out of the windows with tears gathering like pearls on his lashes._

_Haru was born in the summer, he knew, on the thirtieth day of Aran-hazad nineteen years ago. Aran-hazad was mellow and bright in Qasr, sweet with blossoms falling to earth from the trees, and warm as tea in winter; but the draught that ruffled his gown was chilly and sharp, as if the joy of the month was dimmed by the anguish of Haru’s death._

_He glanced at the balcony again and saw that the princess had gone, leaving the balustrade empty. Makoto rose and made his way through the crowd, searching for a friendly face in the babble—Gou’s, perhaps, or Rin’s—but they too had disappeared, and at last he stopped and stood stock-still as he dried his eyes on his sleeve. He wondered why he had not yet woken, for time and again he was dragged from his dreams with sorrow...but perhaps it was known to him now, and so he was left to his grief._

_At once he gasped and nearly leapt out of his shoes, for a slender arm brushed his hand and slipped round his waist from behind, clad in a silken sleeve embroidered from wrist to shoulder. Makoto’s heart thundered in his breast as his body went stiff as a board, frightened beyond measure to look at the woman who held him, to witness the proof that Haru had left him wholly, for he knew he could not have married another while Haruka walked the earth—nor after, unless it was forced upon him for the good of his people._

_But still he had married the dark-haired girl and now she was heir beside him, deserving of his friendship and honor as he had surely vowed them to her. One day she would be his queen, and already she was mother to his child; he could not grieve her now, for her joy was his duty as husband. He took in a breath and steeled himself to turn his head, warding his heart for the blow—_

_“What are you doing here alone, amarya?” came the tender voice, echoing up to the prince’s ears as if from out of a dream. “You were so eager for the autumn feast, my love, and now you are hardly yourself.”_

_Makoto cried out and whirled around on his heel, scarcely daring to believe he knew the laugh that followed, as if it had come from the vaults of his mind, and not from the present at all. His eyes were veiled by a flood of silver as they met a pair of sapphires fringed in black, and then the haze was gone—for Haru lifted his hand and wiped the tears away, rising on tiptoe to kiss his cheek before drawing back in worry._

_“What is the matter, my heart?”_

_Their fingers wove together as if they moved of their own accord, but still Makoto could not tear his gaze from the beloved face before him. It was changed from the one he knew, though only a handful of years had passed since last he saw it. The deep-blue eyes seemed lighter and clearer than they once were, and the shadow that slept within them was gone as if it had never been. Instead they were peaceful and fair as the dawn, and as they stood together there he felt as if he could drown in their depths._

_Haru’s hair was altered, certainly, for it was the hair that deceived him, longer even than Ran’s as it fell down his back to his thigh. It was gathered back from his face by a ribbon, the ends of which were clutched in the brown-haired baby’s mouth as the little one sighed in his sleep._

_“Haru-chan,” he choked, taking the prince in his arms. “What—oh, my darling—”_

_He gasped again as he saw the cluster of dark-blue gems on Haru’s fourth finger, shining like sunbeams on a bed of polished gold. It was his own betrothal ring that glittered on Haru’s hand, the one he had forged in his eighteenth year to give his beloved some day._

_“Why do you cry, shin’ainaru-ko?” asked Haru, resting his palm on Makoto’s cheek. “Tell me, Makoto.”_

_“Because I am glad,” he sobbed, turning his mouth to the ivory thumb and kissing it. “I thought I walked in darkness, lost in the silence without you—and here you are, Haru-chan, as if you had never left me!”_

_Haru had parted his lips to reply; but then he stopped and turned, for their names were being shouted through the crowd. Makoto frowned and looked away, and the breath was plucked from within him a third time when Malka fought her way between a group of dancers to stand at his side_

_“Thank you, Haru,” she panted, wrestling her hair back into its bun. “Did he cry when I went belowstairs?”_

_“Nay, he slept all the while,” smiled the prince, tugging his ribbon from the baby’s mouth. “Hashad takes after you, I think, and not after Momo at all.”_

_He handed the child back to Malka, and the elder prince gasped yet again as he saw the likeness between mother and son. It was not Makoto’s ash-brown hair that covered small Hashad’s head, but Malka’s gleaming chestnut—and from beneath the tiny lashes there shone a hint of gold, for the baby had Momo’s eyes exactly._

_“It will be another hour, or so Rin and Sakura told me,” said the young woman, kissing Hashad’s nose. “Will Milad return by then?”_

_“Aye, he will,” said Haru. “And what of Kisumi? He was meant to be here at noon.”_

_“Sei will come instead,” promised Malka. She tugged at Makoto’s sleeve and laughed before darting away, and with the song of her fading voice the world was lost to the mist—all save the warmth of Haru’s hand, steady and strong in his own as they hurtled back to the realm from whence he had come._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look out for Chapter 16 within the next week or so, and follow me on tumblr at [godmothertoclarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com) for updates!


	16. Where Sapphire Meets the Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which East meets the West, and lovers are brought together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The illustration will be up soon, and expect chapter 17 in mid-May!
> 
> Update: ILLUSTRATION!!!
> 
> [Makoto and Haru on the terrace](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/173879317046/the-calloused-hands-crept-down-to-rest-about-his)

Perhaps there is something to be said, for the old adage that loving hearts care little for the years that lie between them. Many have lived and died to the promise, and Haru found it true the very night he returned from Qasr. 

It seemed to him that he had never been away—or else that both he and Sahrastan had been changed for his absence, as if both were blossomed into glory in the span of their moons apart. It was not the house of his solemn youth that met him at the end of his road, but the lively home of his childhood, with a sister as well as brothers to fill his days with light. And then there was the joy that none of the four had known, for Milad was there with Nagisa, and together they made a whole that laughed in the face of sorrow. 

Haru had long since forgotten what it was to have Jun at Aki’s right where she had always belonged, and when he saw them sitting side by side at breakfast he nearly burst into tears. There was music in the halls of the palace as there had not been for years, for Jun had brought the silken strains of the north in her wake when she came to the city to be wed. All three of the lads were bereft beyond measure when her parents took her from the court, and now that she had returned they could pass the days again as they were meant to do. 

On the morning after their journey’s end they all went up to the study the emperor shared with his brother, without a soul in the council to hear them. Hiromasa and Tamotsu were present, and Kazumi and Kaguya beside them; Aki and Jun sat to the emperor’s left, leaving three places for Nagisa, Haru, and Rei. At length they spoke of all that had passed in Qasr; how Haru had taken half of Makoto’s duties upon himself when the elder prince was wounded in battle, how poorly the eastern provinces had received his growing hand in the royal house—how Makoto had named the younger lad his champion in the tournament, and by his deed made plain to the kingdom that Haru was dear as kin to him. 

By and by the tale came forth to the others, of the friendship between Haru and Makoto, of the debt the sultan declared to his court when Rei saved Makoto from death—of the growing unrest when the epistles from Sardahan came bearing word of Makoto’s illness, and the fear that Haru would be more than the princess’s bridegroom some day—that he would be sultan beside a queen, with power in the East he had never been meant to have. Rei and Haru took their turns at speaking, and it was Haru himself who told of his fall from Nafisa’s back—of the day he nearly drowned in his bath and their speedy departure, and then the afternoon they faced the brigands after their caravan rode from Qasr. At last the princess covered her face with her hands and began to cry, rising from her chair on trembling legs before taking her son in her arms, weeping into his hair as she kissed his darkened brows. 

“Thank Heaven you came home to me safe, sweetheart,” she sobbed. “I should never have let you go—you were nearly lost to us all, my darling, you and your brother both!”

“Nay,  _ okaa-san _ ,” murmured Haru, patting his mother’s shoulder. “Now I have had a fortnight to think I praise the gods for the drought that took me to Qasr, for if not—”

He said nothing more, but the others saw the doubled life in his heart—no longer the grieving heart of a child, but the heart of a man who knew himself as he was: his strength, his weakness, his beauty, his joy…and the warmth in the hearts of the ones who loved him, for together their might drew him forth from the shade so it could not touch him again. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

“What was the promise you made me, when you departed our halls in the summer?”

“Aki!”

“No, I will not be swayed,” threatened his cousin, shaking a fist in his face. “ _ Twenty-five robes  _ I gave you, samite and satins and my finest brocade, only for you to leave them the better part of a thousand miles away!”

“It could not be helped, you know,” chided Haru, unfolding a pile of tunics from his pack and throwing them into a basket. “The pair of us were made to flee for our lives. Of course we could not have brought them.”

“Aye, I know,” said Aki, passing an armful of shawls to Rei. “But now you have nothing to wear for the wedding, and it is only twelve days off.”

“Have you forgotten that he is only nineteen?” sighed Jun. She rose to her feet and danced away to the opposite wall, throwing back the window-panes to let in a breath of air. “He will have to wear a cropped gown to the handfasting, for he is the younger brother.”

“Nay, I did not forget,” said the elder prince. “But I would have dearly loved the amethyst belt from the lavender gown for Rei, and now I shall have to find a second girdle for them both.”

“You care more for your robes than even Makoto’s advisor, Aki-chan,” wondered Nagisa, who was sitting enthroned on a heap of quilts with Milad in his lap. “Have you always been so?”

“ _ Aki-chan?”  _ groaned the steward, flinging a pillow at Aki’s head. “You forget yourself, Nagisa.”

“Nay, he does not,” cried Haru, who was shrieking with laughter. He and Jun collapsed to the floor and rolled about like a pair of children, clutching their stomachs as Milad looked on with childish wonder on his rosy face. “It is a fine name, that!”

“Certainly,” chuckled Aki. “These brothers of mine have always called me by name, impertinent lads that they are. It is kind of you to think of a pet-name for me, Nagisa, for save you nobody has ever given me one.”

“Is that a slight upon me, sweetheart?” teased Jun, filling a tub with Milad’s tiny socks. “You know well enough—”

“Hush!” cried the prince, drawing the maiden to his side. “Not before them, my love.”

Milad shrieked for joy and beat his little hands together as he bounced on Nagisa’s knee, for after their weeks of travelling the merriment of the promised pair was dear as food and drink to him. 

“What is it, then?” smirked Haru, creeping up behind his cousin’s back. “Something sweet as sugar, no doubt, and one he would blush to have us hear.”

“Haru!” wailed Aki, batting at Haru’s shoulder. “Six months you left me alone, and I forgot how you used to mock me when we were children. And now that you are home you’re a lad of eight again, and I must suffer anew.”

“Such is the way of the world, Aki-chan,” shrugged Nagisa. “But there is plenty he would blush to have you hear of himself, if he were wise enough to know it.”

“ _ Nagisa, _ ” warned Rei, flinging himself flat on the rug to reach a pair of slippers under Haru’s bed. 

“Cease your prattle, boys,” ordered Jun. “Put the packs away at once, and bring out your best from the cupboards.”

Rei and Haru scrambled to obey, and scarcely a minute later they stood before her with an armful of gowns apiece. Nagisa took in a breath at the sight of them, for they glittered in the light like a line of polished jewels in all colors; red and black were the most common among them, for those were the hues of the kingdom’s banner. 

“I think the cream-colored brocade will do well for Haru,” said Rei after a moment, cocking his head at the embroidered tunic. “What say you, Jun?”

“It is a fine match for Aki’s and mine,” replied the girl. She took the robe from her brother-in-law and held it up to the light, turning it this way and that so the sunbeams shone like water on the crimson slashes in the sleeves. The piece was stitched from collar to cuffs with gold overlaying the cream, with the Iwatobian sigil for fortune sewn onto the shoulder beneath a garden of pale yellow pearls. “But what of Rei?”

Together they laid out Rei’s tunics on Aki’s bed, and almost as one the five of them sighed in resignation as their eyes went from one garment to the next. 

“Nay, none of them will do,” muttered the manservant. “They are far too plain beside Haru’s.”

“What of the brown and gold you wore to Lord Aichirou’s wedding?”

“I stumbled over the hem of my trousers and stained the thing with wine at Haru’s birthday feast in the summer,” sighed Rei. “I could not wash out the color, so I gave it to Aunt Miho to dye.”

“There was one she was keeping for you,” frowned Jun, tapping her chin as she thought. “It was black satin, embroidered in magenta. Do you recall it, my heart?”

“Aye, I do,” said Aki, relieved. “You have grown taller since you went away, and there is more muscle on your shoulders, but it will be an easy thing for Aunty to alter it.”

“And Nagisa?” asked Haru. “He will attend as Rei’s betrothed, and none of our things are small enough to fit him.”

“Down to Aunt Miho with the both of you, then,” the elder prince commanded. “And you shall come with me, cousin—we must adorn the feasting-court ourselves, and the lanterns arrived from the North last night.”

“Must I?” groaned the younger lad. He and Rei exchanged a pair of weary glances and burst into shouts of mirth, for almost at once the two had remembered their preparations in Qasr: first for Haru’s betrothal night in the last week of summer, and then for the Goddess’s festival and the tournament in autumn.

“Perhaps you spoke rightly, when you said you were glad for the drought,” murmured Aki, eyeing Haru and Rei in wonder. “Never in all my days have I heard laughter so readily from you both, or not for the past eleven years at least.”

“Aye, we were changed for the better,” smiled Rei, brushing the top of Haru’s head. “And praise Heaven, my brother, for our laughter shall never be stilled again!”

“To the feasting-court, then,” sighed the younger prince. “I swear to the Goddess that I still feel the ache in my wrists from knotting the bows for the betrothal gifts—”

“No, Aki will go before you,” said Jun, cooing at Milad as he clutched the back of her gown and toddled across the floor in her wake. “The brocade is an inch too short for you at least, and Aunt Miho will have to let out the seams. What upon earth did you eat in Qasr to make you grow so at your age?”

“More sweetmeats than are good for him,” remarked Nagisa, pinching the prince’s chin. “His cheeks were hollow when he came to Sardahan, and now his face is smooth and fair like a babe’s.”

“Leave off, Nagisa,” said Haru. He put out a hand for Milad’s and scarcely stifled a grin as the baby went to his side, clutching at his slender fingers with a look of utter devotion in his blue-green eyes. With that they went out into the corridor with Nagisa and Rei, leaving Aki and Jun behind them to finish folding the wash. 

It took them nearly a quarter of an hour to reach the craftsmen’s level, for all the folk of the palace were eager to greet the prince and his steward after their months away. Haru found himself trapped in an embrace with half the men of his regiment when he passed the doors to the armory, and realized to his astonishment that he had missed them dearly. There were two lads of his own age whom he had always counted as friends, Asahi and Ikuya by name: the first as redheaded as Sei and Momo, while the latter had hair nearly as black as Haru’s and eyes the hue of mead. Asahi leapt at Rei and then Haru, crying out in alarm when Haru shrank away and put a hand to his chest. Once he was made to understand that the prince had been hurt he clapped him on the shoulder and wished him a swift recovery, tugging his long-lobed ears for luck before going back to the ring. Ikuya said little as Asahi chattered on over his head, but once the younger boy had gone he shook his liege by the hand. 

“It is good to have you back again, my lord,” he said, making him a short bow. “There has been nobody to train the infantry since you went away, and it will be a happy day when you return to the ranks.”

“It will not be long, I hope,” smiled Haru. “How have you fared with the troops, Master Kirishima?”

“Better than he would dare say, for fear you should think him vain!”

The cry was deep and clear as a bell, ringing out through the open doors like a headsman’s call in the desert. Rei and Haru shouted in welcome, for the two men slinging off their hauberks in the armory had been known to them since they were lads: Ikuya’s elder brother Natsuya and their father’s ward, Nao. Both of them had gone to study in Sikandar in keeping with the old tradition, and Haru had not seen them for the past two summers. 

“When did the pair of you return?” cried Rei. “You meant to stay another year in the North, did you not?”

“Aye, we did,” grinned Natsuya. “But we thought it better to finish our training in Sahrastan, for we could not think of journeying home to wed and returning to the monastery again.”

At this last Rei’s jaw nearly fell to the floor, with Haruka’s close behind it. Nao’s cheeks burst into a storm of color as Natsuya took his hand and held it up to the light, catching a piece of polished dragon’s breath set in a band of silver.

“When?” demanded Haru, once he had recovered his senses. “And how—”

“Two months ago, the first night we were back in the citadel,” said Nao, inclining his head to the prince. “And  _ how _ —Natsuya chose to study with the minstrels when he was not at his figuring, and when I went to the musician’s courts to fetch him for supper I found him singing an ode to my name.”

Haru gaped again and stared at the flushing soldier, who turned his face to the ceiling as if something caught in the rafters had interested him immensely. 

“Well, it was not only that,” blustered Natsuya, keeping his eyes on the skylights. “Was your presence not needed belowstairs at the tailors’, Haru?”

“Aye, it was,” lamented Rei, thinking again of the robe he had ruined with wine. “We shall have to sup together soon, but until then—”

Natsuya nodded and dragged his bridegroom and brother into the armory, shutting the doors in their wake so that the others were left laughing on the landing outside. 

“I ought to have known those two would wed,” chuckled Rei, setting Milad on his shoulders. “They passed their days together from the moment Nao came to live with the Kirishima clan,  and not even Ikuya was dearer to Natsuya than he was.”

“Heaven, spare me the word,” grumbled Haru, reclaiming his son with poor grace. “I have heard enough of weddings to last me a lifetime, and I would die a happy man if I need never wear a festival gown again.”

“How can you say such?” gasped Nagisa, feigning a swoon. “You look so lovely in them, Haru-chan.”

“You have never worn a festival gown, have you?” sighed the prince. 

“Thrice or four times, perhaps,” shrugged the younger boy. “My presence was scarcely called for on feast days outside my duties as dancer, and so I was always guest and entertainer both.”

“I wish I could go in a dancing-robe,” said Rei. “I had forgotten the heat, and even out of doors it will be too warm for comfort.”

“There is the  _ raqas’nar _ ,” said Haru, stifling a grin. “You need not worry for that, at least.”

“Hush,” hissed the steward, plucking Milad from his brother’s arms. “Say nothing more about that, if you love me at all.”

Haru glanced up and saw that they had come to the first level, where the best craftsmen of the city practiced their art. As they made their way through the corridors it seemed that he greeted ghosts of his childhood at every corner, accompanied by the laughing voices of Aki, Jun, and Rei. The touch of the marble walls was sweet and bitter both, sweet for the treasure the memories were to him—and bitter as he realized that he had left his childhood somewhere behind in the desert and returned to Sahrastan a man. 

He lifted his hand and knocked on the wooden door, biting his lip as he recalled how often he and Aki had gone down to visit the kindly tailors after they gave up their trades as tutor and nursemaid. Rei took in a breath and clutched at Haru’s hand, and a moment later their eyes were obscured by a cloud of nutmeg hair as Miho flew over the threshold and into their arms.

“Haru!” she sobbed, taking the boys by the ear and yanking them down so they were near enough to kiss her. “How long you were away, the both of you—”

Sasabe appeared at her shoulder with shock on his frozen face, and the moment he beheld the blushing lads he threw himself upon them and hugged them close to his chest. Milad was nearly squashed flat between them, but he set his small jaw and bore it silently until he looked past Miho’s ear and saw a toddling morsel of pink and gold creeping along the corridor. Uma had grown since Haru saw her last, but still she was sweet and dimpled as she was when he departed, and ready with her laughter as Miho had always been. 

“Mama,  _ down! _ ” he insisted, kicking his small feet until Miho and Sasabe let go of Rei. The couple’s daughter was only two months older than Milad, and the little one had never had a chance to meet a child as young as himself. Haru set him down to walk and chortled as the two babies eyed one another solemnly before stretching out a pair of dimpled fingers, meeting half-way as they babbled together in the chirping speech that seemed to be common to infants everywhere.

“Leave those two to play, then,” smiled Sasabe, leading the tots into the centre of the room. “I shall put the kettle on, and Miho will fetch the tape—for you have come to be measured, have you not?”

“Aye, we have,” said Haru. “Nagisa must have a new gown, in violet or cream to match us —and  I cannot say how it happened, but Rei and I grew nearly two inches in Qasr, and our robes will need to be lengthened.”

Miho took the stack of gowns from Rei and turned to Nagisa, ruffling his golden hair before running to the wall where thread and cloth and needles were hung in wooden bins mortared to the stone. 

“Who is this, then?” she said, giggling at the flush that stole over the steward’s cheek. “The fairest lad I’ve had the pleasure to see, and he comes to my chambers on your arm!”

“Nagisa Hazuki,  _ sayidati _ ,” said Nagisa, making her a sweeping bow. “Head of the dancers’ guild in Sardahan, and betrothed to Prince Haruka’s beautiful steward.”

“How in Heaven’s name did  _ that  _ come to pass?” asked Sasabe, staring agog at Rei. 

“Fill the kettle to the top, my love,” cried Miho, wrapping the measuring-tape round Nagisa’s waist. “And bring out the saffron biscuits, for these three shall not leave our chambers until we hear of all their adventures in Qasr!”

“We will be here until nightfall, surely,” grumbled Rei. “I scarcely know where to begin, Aunt Miho.”

“Have you any oatcakes, Aunty?” sang Haru, bounding away to an armchair so that Milad and Uma could climb up into his lap. “There is much to tell, and scarcely time enough to tell it!”

“Aye, I do,” said the seamstress, directing her husband to a cupboard in the back room. “Now sit you down and tell me all, and do not leave out a thing!”

_*_             _*_             _*_

On the third morning after their arrival, Haru awoke to an empty chamber.

Aki had departed for Miho’s rooms earlier in the day, leaving a note on the nightstand to explain his absence to his cousin. Rei had scrawled a message of his own behind it, for Miho had nothing in her workshop to suit Nagisa’s slender frame, and so the lads had gone to be measured for a new set of robes apiece. 

Haru yawned and rolled out from beneath the covers, poking the small lump by the wall as it wriggled away from his grasp. The baby grumbled into Haru’s gown as the blankets fell away, burying his small face in the curve between neck and shoulder to shut away the light. 

“Arise, my heart,” laughed the prince, kissing Milad’s silken brows. “It is time you had a bath, after that goulash you spilt over your frock last night.”

Milad frowned and babbled indignantly into his father’s ear as Haru bore him away to the washroom, filling the iron kettle over the brazier before perching on an upturned pail by Aki’s tub. The novelty of the two great basins had soothed the child into silence, for while their quarters in Qasr had boasted a tub of their own it was only long enough for Haru to lie in with his feet on the opposite ledge. The shelf in the washroom Milad recalled from his homeland bore nothing but three phials of perfumed water and a dish of soap, but the little cabinet beneath the wide bay-window before him held all manners of luxuries for bathing. 

The lion’s share of the lot was Aki’s, polished and perfumed enough to suit the house of a Queen: casks of jasmines’ petals dried to the shade of dust and scented oils in all colors, touched with a drop of coralline for rose and blue milk’s mushroom for violet, whilst the four vials of snow-in-summer were tinted green with thistle’s juice. Beside them was a crystal jar of watered salt and honey, smooth and sweet with almond oil plucked from the kitchen pantries—and seven different molds of soap, from balm and tallow to goats’ milk boiled with ashes.

Haru sighed as Milad took the jar of salted honey from the shelf and toyed for a while with the stopper, prodding the cork with his tiny nails until it came loose from the glass. He seemed immensely pleased with the smell of the stuff within, for he covered his fist with the golden salve and stuffed it into his mouth. 

“ _ Milad _ ,” snorted Haru, easing the jar from his grasp. Milad turned up his nose and sucked at his thumb with glee, bringing a peal of mirth from his father’s lips as Haru bundled the baby into his arms and kissed him from cheeks to chin. 

“That look of yours was mine, I know,” he chuckled, setting the child in Aki’s tub as he opened the sluice-gate above his own. The water streamed down in a torrent of silver, settling like a forest pool at the bottom of the basin before he hefted the kettle and emptied it half-way into the mirrored plain before him. Milad shrieked and beat his sticky palms on Haru’s back, chewing his collar in excitement as a cloud of steam went up from the tub. Haru smiled and broke the surface with his palm, nodding to himself when he found it hot but not too warm for comfort. He stripped the little lad of his clothes and flung them into the basket, plumping him into the water before darting away for the soap. 

The seven shelves in the cabinet yielded a brush of rosewood and ivory, followed by a cake of violet soap and a washcloth. Haru gathered his things and bounded back to the tub, where Milad was kicking his heels in the water and splashing about like a goldfish. The baby made hardly a sound as Haru lathered his inky hair and scrubbed his knees with the brush, for his beady eyes were combing the floor for the jar of balm whose taste he had loved so well.

“No, a hundred times,” said the prince, who had seen the glance and knew at once what it meant. “You are an emperor’s grandson,  _ radhiy _ , and ought not to feast on soap.”

“ _ Mama _ ,” protested the child, licking the last of the salve from his fingers. “Hungry.”

“As am I, my love, but I do not break my fast with bathing-oil,” scolded Haru, pouring a pail of suds over Milad’s back. “The honey was fit for a sweetmeat’s filling, perhaps, but Makoto never kept such foolish things in his washroom.”

Milad grew quiet at the mention of Makoto’s name, gazing up into Haru’s eyes with a film of tears gathering across his own. His lip began to tremble, and to his father’s horror he beat his small hands on the rim of the tub and set up a gurgling wail. Haru dropped the washcloth and took him into his lap, holding his son to his breast until his sobs gave out like a breath of rain in summer.

For a while they said nothing, and naught but the steady drip of water down Haru’s robes broke the quiet as Milad snuffled into his neck. The child had not yet cried for his guardian left behind in Qasr, though for the last five moons until their departure he had slept between the two princes each night save the three weeks of Makoto’s illness. Milad had scarcely borne to sleep with Haru alone before they fled from Sardahan, but even on their first day in the desert he had not cried for a moment. 

_ “Mayit,  _ Mama?”

Haru nearly jumped out of his skin at the word, for Milad had spoken in his own tongue as Makoto had spoken it to him, as his own mother must have done until she perished amongst her fellows and left her son an orphan—and as Haru had only lately learned to do, but still the syllables were clear and fierce like an archer’s barb to his heart. 

“No, darling!” he cried, fumbling for a drying-cloth and wrapping the child from head to toe as he made his way to the bedroom. “No, he is not. He is alive, my baby—”

“Where?” sobbed Milad, burying his face in Haru’s shirtwaist.

“Home,” soothed the prince, rocking him back and forth as his crying grew soft again. “He is at home, sweetheart, with Rin and Gou and Sakura, and we will go back again some day.”

The solemn eyes seemed for a moment as if they fought with some nameless fear within, and Haru took in a breath as the baby bit his rose-leaf lips and laid his cheek on his father’s shoulder. He cursed himself for having forgotten what their removal to the West must have meant to Milad, for it was the second time the child had been taken from all he knew; the first had followed his mother’s death, and whether by wisdom or grief the little one thought that Makoto had gone to join her. 

“ _ Astha? _ ” 

“Aye,  _ astha _ ,” swore the prince, taking the small hands in his. “I swear it.”

Milad burrowed deeper into the soothing arms and clung to Haru like a limpet, so that it took nearly a quarter of an hour to dry and dress him. When all was finished he wound his legs about Haru’s waist and stuck like a stubborn burr, until he permitted himself to be carried on the prince’s back in the basket Aki had brought for him. 

Once they were shawled and slippered against the drafty air they went out into the corridor, pattering down to the vaults where Haru found his costly gift for Ran so long ago. His finger twinged at the memory, and he glanced down to see a line of paler flesh where his betrothal ring had been, standing like a ridge of snow against a sandy cliff. His left hand bore no ornaments but the seal of the royal house, and it was both joy and sorrow to see the lapis trinket lost: sorrow for having relinquished it, for regardless of its meaning the ring had been a gift from one as dear as sister to him — and joy for the weight that had gone from his heart, as if not even the slightest fear of wedding the princess remained. 

At last they came to the lower levels, barred from the passage by spired gates and a line of drowsy guards. Kashi stood at attention behind them, springing from foot to foot like a new-born lamb with a flock of sheep in pasture. 

“ _ Ohaiyou,  _ Prince Haru-chan,” sang the boy. “Do you wish to go within?”

Haru smiled at the old pet-name, and for a moment it seemed as if Makoto’s green eyes shone in the darkness before him, lifting him out of his musings as Kashi clambered into the barrel that stood to the right of the guards and emerged with a wooden stave. He lit the torch in the burning lamp swinging from the ceiling, beckoning the prince to follow as the gates parted soundlessly before them. 

They did not speak as they padded by the doors to the coinage chambers and entered the treasure-halls, lined along the path with tray upon tray of jewels and gold. Milad cooed at the sight and tugged at Haru’s hair, kicking his little feet until there was nothing for it but to set him down to walk. Kashi tore his gaze away from a bowl of moonstones and cocked his head at the prince in question, for Haru had passed between the gems to a narrow corridor on the southern wall, ending at a wooden door half-hidden behind a curtain the color of jade. 

“What is that, Haru?” asked Kashi, running to keep pace with his liege. 

“Come with me,  _ shin’ainaru-ko,  _ and you shall find out,” laughed Haru, lifting the latch and whisking Milad up to his shoulders as the little sentry crept into the chamber beyond. Kashi gasped and nearly dropped his torch, for the room was gilded like the hall where Hiromasa and Tamotsu sat on their thrones with the Princess and the Queen. He set the light in an empty bracket and hurried along at Haru’s heels, matching his paces step for step until they came to a second pair of drapes. These were embroidered from floor to ceiling with the Iwatobian crest, and the prince took hold of the tasselled ropes and pulled until the curtains swept back and vanished into the shadows. 

The glow from the balsam torch flooded into the gloom like a wave, until it seemed that a hundred eyes had woken at once from sleep, blinking in the silence of the alcoves and down from the marble walls. Kashi gasped and stared for dear life, struck speechless with wonder as the figures of generals and emperors and ladies of yore bloomed as one from the rising dust and shimmered out of the darkness. 

They were kind and noble faces, every one of them, often with eyes the hue of cobalt glass and golden bands at their brows. These were the kings and queens who were born to the Nanase clan, and alongside them the consorts who had married into the house, painted together in polished frames that stood as high as Aki did. Haru stopped and smiled at one of the portraits, if portrait it could be called: the charcoal sketch of a scholar in heavy robes, parted from the world by a sheet of muslin. There was nothing about the likeness to mark it as one of his family, and Kashi put his head to the side and wondered what place the drawing had in such a hall as that. 

“Who was he, Prince Haru?” The child bent closer to the picture and frowned, for though the boy behind the veil wore neither jewels nor gold he seemed hardly a stranger at all. His brow and chin were Haru’s exactly, softer and finer by far than the rugged bones of the crown prince and the king. 

“His name was Mamoru, and once he was the youngest son of the Hanamura clan,” said the prince. “He was a musician first, and then a loremaster when he came of age.”

“Why have they laid his portrait here, beside the late Queen’s?”

“You do not know whom she married, then?” laughed Haru. “He was my grandfather, Kashi, and by rights he should have ruled beside her, for she had neither brothers nor sisters of her own. But he was a bard for hire with naught but his wages when they met, and after their wedding scarcely a soul ever saw him again. He spent his days in the royal quarters with Grandmother and then with Father and my uncle, for he wished nothing more than to belong to them alone.”

Mamoru took his leave from the court the moment he and Suhaila were married, and not even to please the lady he loved would he stir from the peace of his hearth. He was playmate and tutor and friend to his sons, and from infancy the two learned all they knew from him. The old man had fallen to the ague before Haru was old enough to walk, leaving queen and country behind as the winds bore him on to his rest. The prince knew little of his grandfather, only that he was kind and shrewd and sang like a lark in the Spring—and that by some trick of fate the youth had caught a princess’s eye, wooing the maiden’s heart for his own before so much as a word had passed between them.

“Is this the Queen Suhaila, then?”

Haru glanced over his shoulder and found that Kashi was standing three paces away, clutching small Milad by the hand. The lads had found a portrait perhaps four feet high and two across, wrapped in purple silk so that naught but a corner of the frame could be seen through the cloth. 

“Aye, that is her.”

He stepped away from the charcoal sketch and past his grandmother’s coronation portrait, lifting the third painting into his arms and ridding the thing of its royal shroud. Milad took in a breath of wonder at the sight of it, for the laughing girl on the canvas was nothing like the solemn ladies gazing down upon him from above. The portrait was one the princess of old had comissioned as a gift for her mother, of Suhaila herself astride a rearing stallion. She had been only twenty-one when the picture was finished and fair as a rose at the fullest bloom of her beauty, with hair as black as the void between stars and eyes that smiled as well as the ruby lips below them. But still her face was fierce and proud, showing the vanished Queen for the pillar of strength she had been: a woman who ruled the greatest land of the West alone, and a general shrewd enough to lead her folk to victory time and again. 

To Haru she had only been Grandmother, with silver winking in the strands beneath her crown and a mourning locket at her breast, one which her infant grandson had chewed into ruin as she bounced him on her knee…and then an avenging angel that spared the small princes from death, felling seven swordsmen with seven shots before they noticed her presence. He had learned only her tender heart, and nothing at all of her spine of steel—for he remembered but a handful of years from the sixty-three she had lived, and the ones he had never known deserved to be honored as highly as the ones he had come to treasure. 

“That is what I came here for,” said Haru, hefting the canvas up to his shoulder. “I will take the torch, then. Will you hold Milad, Kashi?”

“Aye, I will,” chirped the little lad, lifting Milad onto his hip as he dashed ahead to the door where the light still burned in the dusty bracket. He pulled it free and passed it up to his liege, who tucked the portrait under his arm and took the torch in hand. 

Haru said nothing more as they made their way between the countless shelves of precious jewels and metals, but in his wake the children were chattering away together in Milad’s own queer tongue, with which he addressed his playthings when he was left to himself: a funny mixture of the Eastern speech mingled with words from the West, and perhaps a hint of common now and then. Kashi had grown fond of the baby, for he was the youngest of his own family; his elder sister Phina governed his days with a wise and gentle hand, but in the fashion of small brothers everywhere he fancied himself rather put-upon by her ordinance that he ought to rise and retire at a timely hour, and keep his sweetmeats to feast upon once he had finished his supper. 

At last they came to the gates again, where Kashi was delivered back to his bearded father and made to part from his toddling friend. Haru called for an attendant to carry his grandmother’s portrait up to the chambers he shared with Aki and Rei; once the young man disappeared up the central staircase with the painting, the prince sat down on the marble steps and thought of what he meant to do before sunset. 

“I will need wood, I think,” he sighed, running a hand through his hair as Milad yawned and nestled against his stomach. “And what shall I do with you,  _ radhiy? _ Nobody has gone to the shrine for years, and surely there will be far too much dust for you there.”

He found no reply, for Milad had fallen asleep with one of his thumbs in his mouth; Haru smiled and lifted him up, leaving the basket empty as he set off for a breath of air on the terrace. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

“Take the pickles, Haru-chan—they’re lovely.” 

Haru glanced up and rolled his eyes at the younger lad, sighing as Nagisa took a piece of pork on the end of his knife and waved it beneath the prince’s nose as if to tempt him before bursting into laughter. Rei turned crimson under Jun’s delighted gaze, turning away as he plucked the piece of meat between his fingers and dropped it into the dancer’s plate. The steward made a great show of fanning his cheek as if to cool it, but though they were gathered in the kitchens the steaming cauldrons were on the far end of the room, while the six of them dined by the open windows. 

“When you have lived twenty-four years on preserves, you will think more kindly of the fare from your own kingdom,” chuckled Aki. Milad stood up in his uncle’s lap and stole a sugared rose from his dish, tucking it into his tiny mouth before Rei could find voice for reproof. 

“ _ Milad _ ,” chided Haru, brushing the baby’s nose with a gentle finger. “Gruel before sweetmeats, my son. Makoto would tell you the same, and you know it.”

Milad laughed at the mention of the Qasrian’s name, whisking a second rose from Aki’s bowl and stuffing it under his tongue. His father did not have the heart to scold him again, for the poor lad had found nothing he liked so well as fruits and flowers pressed in sugar and honey; his beloved fowl and curried squash could not be had for any price in the West, and he would not eat the spiced and salted meats upon which Haru had grown to manhood. There was naught else left for Milad but roasted serpent’s flesh and gruel of grains and milk, to which his uncles added whatever nourishment the child would take. 

“You will like violets better,  _ radhiy _ ,” sang Nagisa, offering Milad a bit of pickled radish. The baby turned up his nose and looked away, poking out his small red tongue like the bud of a scarlet flower. The cook passed by and brushed the top of the dancer’s head with a smile, setting a bowl of barley candy down beside his dish. The princes’ mouths dropped open, for old Jalaluddin was nothing at all like the kindly cooks in Qasr; he had ruled the kitchens unchallenged for the past thirty years, and whenever Aki and Haru dared brave his domain for tidbits they found themselves driven away with wooden ladles at their backsides. 

“Three days, and already you have taken poor Jalaluddin’s heart,” said Jun, exasperated. “How in Heaven’s name did you sway him to let you remain here after breakfast, let alone pillage his pantries as you please?”

“I could not tell you, I’m sure,” sighed Rei. “But that is Nagisa’s way, and I fare no better before him than Azar does.”

“How else would a lad such as you be won for a bridegroom in six weeks?” teased Aki. “You who have always been careful as if you walked on stilts, throwing yourself headlong into the lay of Dahab-E-Noor—and daring to cherish your youth for the first in all your life, only because you took the lightest heart in Qasr for your own!”

The manservant blushed and buried his face in his goblet, dousing his cheeks in water as Aki roared in glee.

“Never mind,  _ rouhiya, _ ” said Nagisa, giving Rei a consoling pat on the shoulder. “You are wealthy as a king to have caught me, Rei-chan, and you know it is true.”

“Will you mind Milad for the afternoon, then?” asked Haru, thumping Rei on his back as the steward began to splutter. “I must go belowstairs to-day, and I cannot take him with me.”

“Not I,” said the elder prince. “The king and queen of Sikandar arrive tonight with their daughters, and mother has left it to me to ready their quarters and brief the assembly to welcome them.”

“I will take him,” laughed Jun, bending to kiss the baby’s nose. “He and I are friends already. Are we not,  _ radhiy?” _

Milad cooed and tugged at a lock of her auburn hair, bringing a peal of mirth from the lady’s lips as she took him into her lap. The child had grown to love her tresses as he loved his favorite doll, for they were rich and deep in their color where Haru’s were short and black as soot, and long enough for him to weave into tangles as he stood on her knee. 

Once they had finished their afternoon meal, the party broke for the evening. Aki went to the northern wing to see to the guests’ apartments, while Jun took Milad on her shoulders and whisked him off for a walk through the grounds. Rei and Nagisa cleared their dishes and went back to Miho on the craftsman’s level, for she still had need of them to finish their festival robes. 

Haru downed the last of his wine and bounded down the stairs, passing the first level and then the first below the earth where the guards stood watch by the treasure chambers. He found his quarry on the floor beneath, veiled behind a moth-eaten curtain that scarcely a soul had stirred for the past ten years and more. The folk of Iwatobi dared not honor their dead too long, for fear the departed souls would leave a piece of themselves behind, and emerge from the ether diminished when they woke in their next incarnation. But for a time at least the likenesses of fallen men and women were permitted to remain in the shrines, until none still lived to recall them and their places were taken away. 

The prince had only once visited the hall that housed the last painting of his grandmother, perhaps because he would not take the chance of dimming Suhaila’s spirit; but now it seemed to him that the queen had gone for ever, as if until then she had lingered keeping watch for her sons and kingdom. Her cell was the largest of the fifty rooms, and one day long hence Hiromasa’s likeness would replace her.

Haru passed by the silent doors and made straight down the passage for hers, which he opened with breathless care. He was greeted by the portrait of Suhaila astride a horse; he had smuggled it down from his own bedroom the night before, and there at the front of the room was a younger frame that hung in the halls of lore during his grandmother’s lifetime. It was the last that was commissioned while the Queen drew breath, and indeed the only one after her husband perished from sickness. Haru used to look at the thing in breathless awe when he was a child, but now he saw the woman as she was—as all she had ever been, and not as the little he knew of her. 

He had sent a manservant to replenish the oil in the drum that morning, and so he found it ready when he filled the dish at the altar. Once he had pulled a wick from the reel he dropped it into the vessel, setting it alight with his tinderbox and reciting a hymn before facing the silent painting. Having begun his devotion in the way of the Western people, he touched the base of the dusty frame and bowed to the tiles before it, heating his palms in the candle flame as he knelt upon the cushion. 

“Thank you,” he whispered. “I was a fool to mourn that night all these years,  _ obaa-chan _ —what joy it must have been, to live and to love as you did!”

With that he rose and set the picture down on the floor, turning its face to the wall where the second portrait stood waiting, wrapped in its cloth of red and purple silk. Haru laughed and freed the canvas from its prison, lifting it up to the altar where the younger painting had been. 

The likeness of the elder Queen was stained with grime, blackened by years of fragrant incense burning on either side below it; Haru had thrown the sweet-smelling sticks away, for he knew well enough that smoke boded ill for the treasure he held in his arms. The princess’s portrait looked as if it had woken from sleep, glinting in the rosy light where the colors were touched with gilding-paint. Haru blinked and found that his eyes were full of tears, coursing down to his chin like strands of fresh ambrosia—for there the maiden glowed in all her youthful glory, the fiery guardian of a kingdom that endured through the ages in the harshest clime under Heaven. 

Haru left the painting in its place of honor and lit the flames for worship, bending once to his left and then to the right with his tinderbox. The lamps were only wicks of cotton burning in bowls of oil, no wider across than three of his fingers pressed together; once all fifteen were alight he went back to the door where the woodpile sat, covered in dust and gossamer from the years it had lain untouched. 

Over the next quarter-hour he filled the empty dishes one by one, running up and down the room until all twenty were stocked with wood from the southern wall to the north. At last they were full and covered with kindling, ready for the smouldering twigs that set the great bowls aflame. He cried out for joy as the chamber was flooded with molten gold, pouring forth from the iron basins and licking up the marble walls until they deepened from white to crimson. The eyes of the Goddess flashed yellow in their settings before cooling back to grey, but Haru noticed nothing as he resumed his place on the satin cushion before the glittering altar. 

At once the words of the Mother’s prayer floated up to his ears as if from out of a dream, echoing back from the East in a voice he had known and loved: perhaps even before the day he heard it first, he thought, for certainly he had felt its music whilst he slumbered at home in the West—in his visions of lilies and bathing-pools, and the trembling ache that blossomed into his breast the moment he laid eyes on the set of jewels he chose as a gift for Ran.

_ Thou art the Queen, the gatherer of treasures, first in my heart.  _

And how his heart had been swayed, he thought! from happiness to grief, and back again—

_ Through Thou I am sustained, through Thy grace I see, breathe, hear the World outspoken. _

It was Grace itself that lent the prince its hand, standing beside him at all that he did—slumbering in his room so Milad would not weep, who was as a father to the little one when by rights the babe was only the ward of a friend—

_ Thou who doth live in the eyes of Mahar, casting its light over Me! _

Haru had grieved for his vanished youth long ago, sure that naught could heal him save to have it back again. But in Qasr he came to know the warmth of a soul untouched by pain, and like a bud to the rising Sun he woke and blossomed at the touch—the dearest light in the world of men, trapped in a pair of tender eyes the hue of young leaves in the spring.

_ Thou hast but to speak a word, and men and gods kneel before Thee. _

Who could look on the son of Sardahan without wondering at his worth—at a lad whose every thought was beautiful enough for the divine, clear and kind like a drop of rain in the desert—

_ All that is Good art Thou, thine excellence dwelling in Everything! _

It seemed as if a thunderclap had broken upon the chamber, shaking the world to its core as Haru gasped and clutched at the altar to steady himself. The flames guttered in the draft before blazing up twice as brightly as before, and by their doubled light he saw the truth of his heart and knew it for what it was. 

Haru rose from the cushion on trembling feet and backed away from the candles, feeling as if he would fall as a thousand pictures clear as day rushed through the shades of his eyes. He thought of grief and laughter mingled together, of peace and worry wedded in equal measure, and lastly of the prince who stood beside him through it all--of Makoto’s fingers entwined with his own, and himself brought back to glory in the warmth of the prince’s embrace. He had been robbed of all that he knew when he journeyed that summer to Qasr, but with Makoto he learned a Heaven that shone perhaps the greater. 

_ Aye, I love him _ , he thought, and when Haru began to weep at last his tears were tears of joy. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

In the evening Haru was left to himself again, for Rei had gone to look at the stars on the terrace with Nagisa, and Aki and Jun were nowhere to be found; the promised pair had scarcely an hour to spend together through the day, and so their trysts were passed by moonlight in the silken calm of the grounds. Milad was snoring in his little crib, drawn close beside Haru’s own bed; often he could not sleep with his father for the heat, and so by night he had a bed for himself. The prince laughed at the turn in the baby’s mouth and stooped over the cot to kiss him, brushing his tiny nose with a finger before making his way to the balcony.

But before he reached the velvet curtains he found himself lying flat on the floor, stretched in the shadows beside Aki’s cupboard. He winced at the ache in his knee and looked around to see what had tripped him, finding his quarry in a leather strap poking out from beneath the closet; the handle of his travelling pack was clasped around his ankle, for Aki had stowed the bag away without tying the bands together. 

Haru muttered an oath and kicked with all his might, shaking his leg so fiercely that the pack flew out from its place and hit the back of his cousin’s chair. A faint clink rang out from within the bag, high and clear as if something made of metal had fallen against the wooden frame. Haru frowned and took the bag in his arms, for he and Rei had emptied it the morning after their arrival, and beside their garments it had held nothing but Milad’s small shoes. 

Near its bottom he saw that a finger’s length of stitches had been torn out from within, leaving only the outer row to hold the saddlebag shut. The missing threads had left a pocket in the lining, and when Haru pressed it between his thumb and forefinger he felt something caught between the flaps of linen. He plunged his arm into the pack and fumbled for the broken seam, emerging with a square of embroidered velvet scarcely bigger than his knuckle. Haru wondered perhaps if it belonged to Rei, but then he dismissed the thought; the steward had never brought his masters’ things to harm, and certainly he would not have cut the threads by design. 

The size of the sachet belied its weight, for it was no longer across than a Western copper, but still it was heavy on Haru’s palm like the nail of an iron horseshoe. He toyed with the strings of the packet and brought the underside up to the light, taking in a breath at the sigil that gleamed on the cloth. It was Makoto’s own seal, of a white mare against a ground of desert willows, and one he had dearly missed in the three weeks since his departure from Qasr; he realized with a jolt of astonishment that Makoto had filled the pack himself, and that Makoto’s own hand must have been the one that hid the sachet there. 

Haru poked at the object within, wondering why his friend had said nothing of the gift, why he had stowed it away beneath the folded garments, tucked safely into the seam at the bottom of the pack—and what the Qasrian could have wished to give him so desperately, that he thought of the thing amidst his choking sorrow when Rei and Haru were made to flee the palace that night. He untied the ribbons at the hem of the little bag before turning it up on the covers, brushing the hair back from his eyes so he might see the present unhindered. The trinket slipped like silk through his fingers as he loosened his hold, dropping onto the quilt with a thud when he drew the sachet away.

“Oh,  _ amarya _ ,” sobbed Haru, burying his face in his arms. “Oh, my love—”

Years could have come and gone before he lifted his cheek from his sleeve, for such was the power of the treasure before him that he felt as if he would shatter from within if he looked upon it another moment. There on the bed lay a circle of cobalt fire, glowing in the lamplight like a goddess’s hoard of suns—drops of liquid flame in the hearts of golden lilies, wrought in precious metal and smooth and warm to his touch. 

The white hand trembled like a leaf before bending down to grasp it, for he knew the meaning of the gift as surely as he knew his own name—that his heart was mirrored pulse for pulse in the East, and his warmth of his love returned like the moon reflecting the day. 

Once he held the ring between his palms he burst into tears anew, kissing the jewels again and again until his lips grew sore with his breathless laughter. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

On Isha’s day the princes were permitted to sleep as long as they wished, for the nobles from Sikandar and Tirah Alis had been settled into their quarters and instructed to call for the servants if they wished. Aki’s snores rang out from the bed beside Haru’s like the slumbering grunts of a bear, echoing off the walls until Haru seized a pillow from the floor and clapped it over his ears.

“Aki,” he grumbled, pulling the covers up over his head. “Hush, for the love of heaven!”

Aki turned to the wall and buried his face in a cushion, calming his breaths enough that Haru dropped his pillow and shut his eyes again. Milad had not yet woken, and for the first time since their departure from Qasr he had taken the hem of his father’s gown in his hand, holding it fast as he dreamed as if to keep him near. 

For the next hour there was scarcely a sound in the chamber save the princes’ breathing, for they were far too weary from their work to think of beginning the day. Even Rei was fast asleep in his own bedroom, curled up under a pile of blankets as he had grown used to doing in Sardahan. Nagisa had gone down to the kitchens long ago, for his stomach had taken the poor lad from his bed and drawn him away for his breakfast. 

Perhaps the winds were curious as they blew in through the screens, for Aki was never one to keep still for long, nor Rei—and already the folk of the palace were going about their business, stoking fires and commencing their work for the morning as the sun rolled on in the skies. But the brothers looked like children at rest as they lay, and so the breezes passed them by and went to amuse themselves with the laughing guards in the entrance hall below. 

It was nearly midmorning when Haru lifted his lashes at last, shrieking out in alarm at his awakening—for Jun was shaking him by the shoulders, having kicked down the door and stormed into the princes’ apartment with dust and sweat on her orange gown. 

“Get up!” she called, dragging him bodily from the bed before running across the room to do the same to Aki. “Get up, both of you, and wash and dress as quickly as you can. You are needed on the terrace with Rei, and before the hour is out!”

“What do you mean?” mumbled Aki, falling onto his mattress again. “I don’t mean to go riding today, my love.”

“I care nothing for your riding, Aki,” said Jun, bringing a pillow down on his face. “There is a caravan approaching the eastern border, a hundred strong at least. I was on the seventh balustrade with the watch, and I saw them cross the horizon. Ram-Susah has come, and you and Haru must be present to welcome them.”

“Ram-Susah?” asked Rei, poking his head round the corner. He frowned and straightened his spectacles, peering over the rims at his sister-in-law. “They were meant to come the day before the wedding, were they not?”

“Aye, they were, but they are here now,” sighed Jun. “Bathe and put on your best. Their Queen will be among the company, and all the princes save the youngest.”

“The princes of Ram-Susah are a jolly lot, I remember,” said Haru, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Very well, then. We will be ready in half an hour, and down on the terrace to greet them in time.”

“A quarter-hour, Haru,” chided the maiden, glancing at the frame of weighted incense burning by the window. “You must be there when they pass the city gates, lest your lateness be taken for offense.”

“How can they take offense?” groaned Rei, falling flat on the rug and gazing up at the ceiling. “When they are the ones who have come three days early, and without a word of notice? And what of Nagisa? He and I were meant to break our fast together, but when I woke his pallet was empty.”

Milad toddled over to his side and sat on his chest, for the outcry had woken him the moment Jun came into the room. It seemed as if the baby shared the steward’s opinion, for he mimicked Rei’s look of exasperation and looked up at his laughing aunt with a twitch in his feathery brows. 

“Recall what the Princess taught you, Rei,” chuckled Jun. “A lady arrives when she wishes to, and the lords who receive her must do so with grace. Nagisa and I were playing at cards when we glimpsed the caravan, and he went to carry the message to her Highness and the Queen.”

With that the three boys saluted the maiden and made off at lightning speed: Aki to fill the tubs and Haru to gather their clothes, while Rei upturned the princes’ jewel-boxes for a set of suitable gems. Jun dashed across to the chest of drawers to find an embroidered gown for Milad, and before the next bell had fallen from the timepiece the lads were washed and dressed. Haru was clad in a long tunic of royal blue, without an overgown to cover it—for he had not yet come of age, and the right to wear one was granted only to lads who had passed their twentieth year. He sat before the glass without complaint as Rei took a brush to his hair, smoothing it as well as he could before setting a silver circlet on his brother’s head. A moment more and Haru was fully adorned in his jewels, with a pair of sapphires dangling from his ears and a moonstone locket on his breast. 

There was a scuffle at the dressing-table as the three lads lunged for their rings at once, but at last the shining trinkets found the fingers to which they belonged; four seals for Aki and three for Haru, for the lapis ring had been lost to the brigands. Rei had only his sigil and the emblem of the royal house to find, and so he was first to emerge from the melee; the amethyst ring never left his hand, save for the minutes he passed in the bath. 

“Hurry!” cried Jun, glancing out the window. “They will lift their colors before long, I am sure.”

“Aye, my love,” said Aki. “But my girdle—Rei, which shall I wear?”

“The one embroidered with gold and seed-pearls,” said Rei, who was busy hunting for his slippers. “And you, Haru? Take the sapphire, to match your gown.”

“Nay,” said the younger prince, plucking the thing from the steward’s hands and returning it to its hook on the wall. He fought with the flush in his cheeks as he pointed to a plain belt of dove-grey silk, with only space enough in the pocket for a handful of coins. Makoto’s betrothal ring was hidden in the band with six flat pieces of silver; the silken sash was the only one he had worn for the past four days, for though he dared not show the jewel to the others he could not bear to part from it. 

“Again?” asked Jun, furrowing her brow. “It is all you have worn since the day you shut yourself in the shrines.”

“Aye, the sapphire belt would suit you better,” called Aki, thrusting his feet into a pair of embroidered shoes. 

“Give me the silk, and let us be gone,” sighed Haru, tugging the thing from the steward’s fingers and clasping it round his tunic. He traced the shape of the golden band against his waist before dodging a blow from Jun and fleeing the chamber, laughing at the top of his lungs as Aki whisked Milad up to his shoulders and dashed down the passage in his wake. Rei lifted his eyes to Heaven for patience and followed, shouting over the balustrade as Nagisa met him on the stairs with Kashi clinging to his gown. 

So it was that they tumbled down to the first level, chattering like a band of merry mice as they went. Haru put a hand to his breast as he ran, for never before had he felt as if his heart would burst for the love enshrined within it. There was his love for Aki and Rei, strong and deep like the bones that upheld him, and for Jun as the sister Haru never had—for the son who drew him forth from eleven years of shadow, for the child who had always been as a brother to him, for the mischievous lad from Qasr who became his friend.

There was but one more who ought to have stood beside him, one dearest of all whose name sang through his blood like the sweetest of hymns, one from whom he would never be parted again, whenever their fates saw fit to let them meet once more—

“Straighten your veil,  _ rouhiya _ ,” chided Rei, righting the band over Nagisa’s brow. “You cannot go to receive a queen with silk hanging over your face.”

“It is only because I have been carrying messages right and left all morning,” laughed Nagisa, brushing his veil aside. “Look, Rei-chan—we can see to the gates from where we stand!”

“Aye, the town lies far below the terrace,” said Jun. “We will be able to see the flags from the balustrade before they pass the gates.”

Haru craned his neck and counted the clouds of roiling dust half a mile from the citadel, brushing his hair from his eyes as he gazed away to the east. 

“A hundred guardsmen at least, just like Sikandar and Alis,” he said, noting the silvery gleam that could only have come from sunlight striking a forest of lances. 

“Ram-Susah, to be sure,” murmured Rei. “Did they leave their own halls early, do you think?”

“They must have done,” frowned Aki. “It is a thirteen days’ journey from their capital, and surely they could not have made the trip in ten.”

“If they drove their beasts for seventy miles each day, perhaps,” frowned Haru. “But sixteen leagues is the most our own  _ zahids  _ can do, and they are stronger by far than the ones from the East.”

The piercing cry of a hundred horns rang out from between the dunes, and then the flags of the royal house were lifted at once to the skies. Together they shone like a barren wood with the cloth wrapped round the staves, until the headsman’s call rose up to the sun and floated over the city to the watchers on the terrace. Haru heard the high-pitched note and felt as if he would shout, as if he could not keep still for an instant longer—watching for the blue and gold of Ram-Susah, clutching the hem of Aki’s sleeve as the banners blossomed together like a garden beneath the sun. He shaded his eyes and squinted against the light, wondering why the stripes of blue seemed almost as if they were touched with red—

A moment later he choked out a gasp and clutched his heart, scarcely daring to believe what he had seen. Jun and Rei were muttering behind him, but he paid them no heed as he threw himself against the balustrade and looked to the East as if he had never known a dearer sight in all the days of his life. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Green, for the leaves of the Qasrian willow.  _

“Nay, not Ram-Susah,” breathed Aki, taking a step forward. 

_ Plum, for the flesh of the Qasrian fig.  _

“Why?” whispered Jun, coming to stand beside Haru. “He wrote to tell us of the unrest in his court—surely it is danger for him!”

_ And white for the foam of the Eastern sea.  _

“Mako-chan!” screamed Nagisa, clinging to his intended’s shoulder like a squirrel and jumping up and down. “He came, Rei-chan, he came!”

Haru stood frozen to the railing, dimly aware that his heart was galloping within him like a racehorse fresh from the track. It seemed as if all the joys of his life were crowding up into his breast, setting his shaking limbs aflame as the caravan passed the gates. He searched their ranks for the precious hint of green, though he knew well enough he could not hope to see it until Makoto stood on the terrace before him. Milad was shrieking in Aki’s arms, as if he had tasted his father’s glee for himself—and perhaps he had, for the tears coursing down the prince’s cheeks were mirrored drop for drop on his own.

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Come forth, O my Lord! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

It was nearly half an hour before Masoto’s party came from the city border to the lower gates of the palace, though to Haru it felt as if he had scarcely a minute for breath in the meantime. Rei and Nagisa had given up all pretense of dignity, and were dancing together arm-in-arm as Hiromasa and Tamotsu withdrew to the steps for a hurried conference with the princess and the Queen. 

“I was right, Rei-chan!” sobbed the dancer, wiping his face on the steward’s sleeve. “I knew he could never bear to remain away—I knew it from almost the moment they met, and now you see!”

Haru heard neither Nagisa’s cry nor the manservant’s answer, for his eyes were fixed on the milling crowd just within the palace gate. He saw them now, for their heads and faces were bare to the light—their veils thrown back to their shoulders, hanging down their backs like shawls cropped short at the waist. There were the children, all three of them: Hayato riding before Kisumi and Ren with Momo, while Ran sat astride the tallest of the beasts with her elder brother behind her. The world went pale, as if the heat of the Western sands had lost their power for love, and though the Qasrians took their time as they crossed the grounds Haru noticed nothing as they went. All he knew was the darling name repeated again and again in the thundering beat of his heart, and that if he stretched out a hand to touch him—

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Shatter this distance that lies between us! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

“Look,” breathed Natsuko, making the sign of the Goddess’s lamp on her breast. She pointed up the stairs to the balconies on either side, where the chattering crowd bent over the rails to better see the Qasrians below. “Is that—”

“Aye,” breathed Rin, sliding to the ground as his camel nipped at the back of Momo’s gown. He put a hand to his mouth and laughed in relief, standing on his toes to see over Sakura’s head and turning to look for his liege. But Makoto had passed both Rin and the Queen for his swiftness, staring up at the boy standing above them with tears in his grass-green eyes. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Sing praises by the throne of your beloved _ —

_*_             _*_             _*_

The figure was clad in a velvet robe the hue of a twilit sky, dark and fair like a plain of tranquil waters at midnight. A golden circlet glittered like a nimbus on his brow, worn in the fashion of the West—lying against the strands of his hair instead of beneath them, with a piece of blue chalcedony winking on his snow-white forehead. Makoto found voice with a sob and a laugh in one, for the clenching fear in his blood had not left him since the morning the brigands knelt before the court a fortnight ago. Haru’s sweet face might as well have been the sun for its brilliance, blinding the elder prince where he stood as he gazed up at the dearest sight he had beheld in all his life. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ You brought me West in your wake, O my Lord! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

He wondered if some foreign power had stolen into his body, but then the stillness was gone, and Makoto found himself with one foot resting on the first of the marble stairs. He mounted them lightly as if the chuckling zephyrs were lifting his heels from the stone, as eager to see him reunited with Haru as Makoto was himself.  The prince dared not look back at the others, for fear that the vision before him would vanish—but somehow he knew they were following far behind, keeping their distance as if they feared to intrude upon his joy. 

It mattered not that kings and queens and princes stood about them, and nor could he bring himself to mind that his heart was bare to the heavens. All he knew was the quivering of his palms as he reached out for the slender figure by the balustrade, living and breathing and whole as Makoto had longed to see him for the past twenty-two days, each as lengthy as an age as he counted the hours from their parting.  As his veil slipped loose from his brow he began to run, and hardly an instant later he held his beloved in his arms. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Without you the stars are empty, my love _ —

_*_             _*_             _*_

Haru had not learned until that very instant, how dear Makoto was to him, how swiftly the tears welled upon his lashes as the elder lad swung Milad up to his shoulders, how their hasty parting had wounded him nearly unto death—nor how fiercely he had longed for the warm circlet of sapphires and gold to crown his calloused finger. It was odd to see him thus, robed and veiled in heavy linen against the rising dust. But there they shone, as ever—a pair of emerald stars as green as the winter sea, and before he had realized it Haru pulled his hand from Rei’s and cast himself into Makoto’s arms. 

The embrace was one they had known time out of mind, and yet at once it was new and strange. Never before had Haru’s hands trembled about the Qasrian’s neck, and never before had he felt the breath snatched from his lungs as he found himself drawn closer to the shrunken body, still gaunt with the lingering weakness of a fortnight’s deathly sleep. They were not like Nagisa and Rei, between whom worlds could pass with the touch of a satin palm. They were themselves alone, and within the gentle eyes Haru found all he wished and paid it forth a thousandfold. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ O sweetheart! come forth and set them aflame! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

He passed his boyhood as a shallow pool in the fiery desert, drained day by day even as he gloried in the depths of its beauty—and no one mourned as he did when he was sent away to the east. But it was in the east that Makoto came to him, for always Makoto had been the first to stretch out a hand and trust without fear that Haru would follow. It was there in the gardens of Qasr that he learned his heart as it was, sped from home by a ravenous flame, and found himself refreshed like a traveler quenching his thirst by a stream. 

The union of earth and water had brought the shades of Heaven to life, singing blossoms and beasts from the air as they built their wedded home by the sea. And so it was for them, for as they drew together their friends found a hearth in one another’s arms—Nagisa and Rei, Sakura and Rin, even Hayato and Ran—and for their love Haru burned all the brighter, made new again like a cloudy pearl forged beneath the sighing waves. 

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ O eternally dear, the one who fills my days with light and color! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

Suddenly Makoto freed himself from Haru’s grasp, fumbling in the pocket of his robes before emerging with an embroidered sachet stitched from mouth to end with azure butterflies. He shook it out over his palm, which flashed silver and blue as the old betrothal ring tumbled down from the velvet bag. 

“I brought it back for you,  _ amarya _ ,” he said, putting out a gentle hand for his friend’s as Aki’s dark eyebrows travelled steadily up his forehead. “Shall I—”

“Nay,” breathed Haru, reaching into his girdle for the circlet of sapphires and gold. The sunbeams fell down to the gilded blossoms as if they knelt in prayer, setting the stormy jewels ablaze until the prince’s cheek grew rosy with their light. “I have a better one.”

_*_             _*_             _*_

_ Bless me with Thy grace, my Lord, and do not leave my side! _

_*_             _*_             _*_

At once the earth was shaken to its core—the shadows grew bright, the sands turned to fire—for the next moment the lapis ring fell clattering to the tile, and Haru found himself dragged forth and into Makoto’s arms as the Qasrian caught his mouth in a kiss, suntanned brows meeting ivory as Haru returned the embrace with all his might. The calloused hands crept down to rest about his waist, quivering against his robe as if they could scarcely believe what lay cradled between them. It was the softness of the touch that was his undoing, Haru thought—light as a leaf and twice as lovely, and as he brought his own hands up to Makoto’s shoulders he began to weep where he stood as if his heart would shatter within him. 

“Do not cry, sweetheart,” whispered Makoto, wiping the tears from Haru’s face. “Oh, darling, I love you so—”

Their faces met once more like the poles of a sailor’s lodestone, as if they could no longer bear to be parted after their weeks of longing—and then their eyes were opened at last, permitting heaven and earth to embrace like the pulse of their trembling lips. Haru had little more than an instant to reply in kind, for as he leaned up on his toes again a crash and a cry sounded from the stairs behind him, as well as a peal of laughter from Kazumi and Kaguya. He turned on his heel to see Rei and Kashi fanning his cousin’s face, hardly restraining their glee as they raised the fallen prince by the balustrade. Aki had fainted, crumpling to the floor in a heap at the weight of the scene before him. 

“It is too much, Jun,” he groaned, stirring feebly in the maiden’s lap. “What is the meaning of it?”

“That your cousin is the light of my days, Highness,” said Makoto, crossing the terrace to kneel at Aki’s side. “And that I would wed him if I may, and live the rest of my life beside him.”

Aki’s eyes rolled back in his head a second time, and in the tumult that followed Masoto took his Queen aside and muttered into her ear. 

“Forgive me for my foolishness, my love, but that was not the child we betrothed to him,” he said, staring agog at the balcony as his son embraced his sister’s intended so fiercely that the sultan blushed to see them. 

“Nay, it was not,” replied his wife, grinning as a storm of applause broke out among the Qasrians. Masoto frowned at her for a moment longer before leaping back in astonishment, for the gleam in her eye was the gleam of satisfaction and plain as day to him. 

“You  _ knew _ ,” he accused, bursting into laughter himself as the Iwatobian prince was carried indoors. “I am the sultan—yet not a soul sees less of what passes before him than I!”

* * *

_ Haru scarcely realized he was dreaming, for the sparkling tiles of the entrance hall were as familiar to him as his own reflection. It was a minute or longer before he recalled that he was meant to be sleeping in the double bedchamber in the palace of Sahrastan, with Makoto’s betrothal ring worn proudly on his finger rather close to his side in the pocket of his girdle. The prince glanced up at the skylights and saw that it was dark in the heavens beyond, for the skies were black as tar and bright with the glow of a handful of stars.  _

_ He could see no one save the sentries standing guard by the door, rubbing their faces as they leaned on their staves. Haru nearly laughed at the sight of fifteen-year-old Sanim, who had grown into a handsome lad of twenty or more with a noble look in his eye. The soldiers roused themselves enough to bow as he passed, and looking down at his left hand he saw that the sigils were changed—he no longer wore the rearing dragon of the Iwatobian seal, for on the ivory skin of his forefinger there gleamed the spinel and gold of the Qasrian willow. Makoto’s betrothal ring glittered on his fourth finger, and below it he saw a thin band of gold that seemed to meld to the jewels above—the handfasting promise worn by some of the nobility, signifying that he was not only promised in marriage but wed.  _

_ At once there came the sound of hurrying feet, drawing Haru from his musings as he came to a halt and looked over his shoulder to see what the noise had been. The guards were as still and silent as ever, and the corridor that led to the kitchens was dark and quiet as it always was after sundown. He frowned and glanced up the staircase, pausing for a moment to marvel at the steps winding round and and round the walls as they stretched to the vaulted ceilings above. As his gaze passed the third level his eyes lit upon a small figure standing by the rails, gazing down at his father below with a smile on his childish face.  _

_ For a moment it seemed as if the palace had fallen away, and a breathless wind had carried him far into the future to gaze upon Milad as he would be some eight or nine years hence. Haru stood as still an effigy as he clutched at the grip of the banister, for the lad before him was tall and strong with hair that fell down to his waist in the Iwatobian fashion, pulled back from his brow and twisted into a heavy braid as he leaned out over the railing on the floor above.  _

_ His eyes were not altered, at least, and as ever his father could put no name to their color—balanced half-way between blue and green and shining like a pair of stars as he blinked against the moonlight. But perhaps it was fitting, he thought, for Milad was Makoto’s son as well as his own, and in him the twain were mingled so completely that neither of the princes could tell themselves apart.  _

_ “Aita!” cried Milad, nearly toppling over the balustrade to the landing below as he waved. “Whatever are you doing down there?” _

_ “Take care, my son!” came a worried shout from the hallway behind him, which flashed yellow and gold as Makoto passed the velvet curtains with a burning lamp in hand. He took hold of Milad’s shoulder and drew him back from the rail, shaking his head in despair as he leaned down to gaze at his husband below.  _

_ “Come up to me _ ,  _ my love,” he called, passing the light to Milad and shooing him back down the corridor to his bed.  _

_ Haru blinked a film of tears from his eyes and rose up the stairs to meet him, taking the Qasrian’s hand the moment he stood within reach. Makoto set a palm on his cheek and bent to kiss his brow, wrapping an arm round his waist as they returned to their quarters in the royal wing.  _

_ “Where did you go, amarya?” asked Makoto, once they were lying side by side in the bed they had shared before Haru was made to flee from Sardahan so long ago. “I woke and found you gone from my side, and I feared—” _

_ “You need never fear,” murmured Haru, receiving a second kiss on his mouth as he drew the covers up to his chin. “I am yours, my darling, in life and in death, yours as rays belong to the sun from whence they were made.” _

_ Makoto blinked in surprise, for it seemed as if the words were known to him—as if they had stirred some vein of memory that had lain untouched for years, bringing his heart to the light anew as he set Haru’s palm on his cheek.  _

_ “What have we to do to-morrow?” asked the younger prince, yawning into his pillow as he threw an arm over Makoto’s side.  _

_ “Naught we cannot put off, my love,” laughed the Qasrian. “Shall we take Milad to see the acrobats in the square? He has been talking of nothing else for a week, and I fear that Rin would steal him away with Toraichi and Ami if we did not go ourselves.” _

_ “Aye, he would, trickster that he is,” chuckled Haru. “Sleep, sweetheart—we will have to be up at the crack of dawn if we mean to leave for the day and ready the court before we go.” _

_ Makoto nodded and settled his chin into Haru’s hair, falling silent as the princes drifted on towards slumber. He was fast asleep before long, and when the chamber was filled with a veil of mist his husband did not fear waking—for the living prince was waiting for him in Sahrastan, and a shining wealth of precious days to follow the morning before them.  _

 

_*_             _*_             _*_

 

_ O envoy of the Lord!  O friend of the fallen! _

_ Move thy feet forward, and bridge this distance between us _

_ Enter your beloved’s house, for it is empty without You _ —

_ And ‘tis thou alone who fills his days with color! _

_ He commands, and the world unfolds to please him. _

_ The one who walked in the endless night before Time _

_ His heart beats on within me, his breath alive in my veins _

_ All I have known and sought to know, and all who sought to know me, _

_ ‘Tis thou who commands, and the world unfolds to please you! _

_ For you are the Truth and the Goddess’s glory, _

_ Take the hues of my flesh from my soul, O Lord _

_ And paint them again and afresh with your own! _

_ The morning rain has blessed my brow and shoulder, _

_ And breaking in the silence like your song upon my ear, _

_ Cleansing the shades of the darkness within me _

_ For drop of strength you gave has nourished me, my Lord! _

_ You are within and without me, around and beside me, _

_ I am within you, having come to your kingdom to seek you. _

_ May there be naught but sweet Fortune before you, _

_ As your love has brightened Heaven above me! _

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow. Seven months of chronicling these absurd adventures, and our lovebirds have finally gotten a clue (coincidentally, almost seven months have passed from the beginning of the fic!)  
> To all of my readers: thank you so, so much for staying with me this long--but don't go yet, since we've got a whole series to tackle after Slain By Fire is completed!! Follow me at [godmothertoclarion](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com) for updates and feel free to send me an ask or message if you like!!!!! <3


	17. A New Dawn, A New Day

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Aki and Jun are married at last, and Momo takes to the kitchens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I am so, so sorry for this late update. Both alsas and I have had school, and this chapter was the longest yet at almost 19k words. But we do have a beautiful illustration for Chapter 16, so please go check it out if you haven't already! 
> 
> [Makoto and Haru on the terrace](https://godmothertoclarion.tumblr.com/post/173879317046/the-calloused-hands-crept-down-to-rest-about-his)

Later that night the princes retreated to their quarters with Nagisa and Rei, having said farewell to their guests after supper. By custom the visiting nobles would not all feast together until Ram-Susah’s arrival, and so only a handful of dignitaries from each of the four parties had joined the Iwatobians to dine. Makoto was the last to part from his beloved at the door, and he would not let go of Haru’s hands until Momo crept up behind them and tugged at his ear.

“ _Ahlam jamila_ , Haru-chan,” murmured the Qasrian, bending to kiss Haruka’s brow and then Milad’s. He glanced back over his shoulder as Rin and Momo led him away, leaving Aki and Haru alone in their chambers. Rei and Nagisa had vanished into the steward’s room; from the shrieks and crashes that drifted back to the elder lads, it seemed that the dancer was chasing his betrothed from wall to wall with a mouse he had caught in the kitchens.

“So,” said Aki, sitting cross-legged on his bed and holding out his arms for Milad. He lifted his brows and stared at his cousin, breaking into raucous laughter at the flush that crept up into Haru’s cheek. “The prince of Qasr, _shin’ainaru-ko_?”

“Aye,” murmured Haru, pressing the sapphire ring to his lips. He glanced up again to find that Aki was smirking, leaning back against the satin cushions with Milad sleeping in his lap.

“He is a fine-looking lad,” remarked the elder prince, grinning in the darkness like the long-haired cat that prowled the palace stables. “Such handsome eyes, my brother! green as the winter sea, and such a face as that—”

“Hush!” ordered Haru. He turned his face away from his cousin and went to stand before the glass, trying with all his might to keep the color from his face as he undid the clasps of his robe—but still he could not ignore his cousin’s snickering, driving a flood of crimson into his cheeks as Aki smothered his glee in the pillows.

They went to bed not long after that, for it was close upon midnight, and all four of the lads had grown weary from the day’s excitement. Nagisa was the first to fall into slumber, sprawled like a mat on the flagstone floor until Rei flung him over his shoulder and hauled the dancer back to his own room. Haru took Milad from Aki’s arms and stretched himself beneath the covers with his face to the wall, ignoring the catch in his brother’s breathing as he cackled into the sheets. The princes were asleep scarcely five minutes later, each one dreaming of his own sweetheart as the hours passed by.

But upstairs Tamotsu was lighting the lamps in his brother’s study, while Kaguya summoned a manservant to bring pots of freshly-brewed _qa’hua_ from the kitchens to keep them awake. Kazumi and Natsuko were sitting side by side, laughing over a tale from Haru’s childhood while Masoto pushed his reading-spectacles closer to his eyes so he could better read the sheaf of papers that lay on the table him. Hiromasa had a feathered pen between his teeth, chewing at the point as the sultan began penning an intention of betrothal in the sharp-angled script of the common tongue.

“I am so glad it came to rights in the end, Natsuko,” sighed Kazumi, tucking her palm beneath her cheek. “We dared not say anything about it when we visited your city in the summer, but even then we knew that the love between them ran deeper than friendship and brotherhood both. I prayed Haru would never realize it, for he has loved so seldom in his life that he could not have borne to leave Makoto’s side.”

“What of you?” asked the elder woman, taking Kazumi’s hand. “He is your only child, after all, and surely you never expected him to depart after his marriage.”

“No, I never did,” smiled the princess. “But I never expected to have my boy back again—my child as he was, without the grief of his youth to pain him. It has been food and drink to see him laugh again, and perhaps I will grieve for longer than I ought. But he will not go to the East alone, and I could ask for nothing more.”

“There, I am finished,” announced Masoto, passing the scroll to the emperor. “These are the terms of betrothal amongst our people, Hiromasa. Her Majesty and the Princess know them well, but perhaps you—”

“I had forgotten,” Hiromasa admitted. He passed a glance down the page and nodded in approval, laughing as he pulled a stick of wax from the chest of drawers and melted it over a flame. “To think I set my hand to one of these six moons ago to promise my nephew to your Ran! I never dreamed I would seal a second contract for him come winter.”

“Nor had I hoped to sign one for Makoto at all,” grumbled the sultan. “Three years he had since his coming-of-age, to marry—but it is better so, for there is no other lord or maid I would wish for him now that I have known your son, Tamotsu.”

“And I,” chuckled the prince. “He spoke of nothing but Makoto in his first letter to me, and I could scarcely believe he had written the note himself. He made scarcely a single friend in all his nineteen years in Iwatobi, and yet he found one so dear within his first week in Qasr!”

“I knew he and Makoto would wed from the moment he stood before me.”

The others turned in their seats to stare at Natsuko, while Masoto shook his head with a smile.

“Surely not, my love?”

“Say what you will,” laughed the Queen, exchanging a pair of mirthful glances with Kazumi and Kaguya. “It is a woman’s affair, sweetheart, and you cannot be blamed for having noticed nothing. But I knew it as surely as I know to expect the sun on the morrow, and now you see I was right!”

“There,” said Hiromasa, who had gone cross-eyed in his efforts to spy the blotch of ink adorning the end of his nose. “All is left are their names and sigils, and now we can put the matter aside until Aki’s wedding is over and done with.”

“I envy you both, my lords,” sighed Masoto. “Only one child apiece, and both are spoken for. I cannot bear this two more times, or I shall not live to see my second grandchild.”

Kazumi’s eyes grew wide with astonishment, and for an instant it seemed as if she would weep. But she dashed the water from her lashes before her husband had time to comfort her, and reaching across the table she grasped the sultan’s hand. He read the silent question in her touch, nodding once in her direction before she released him.

“Milad will be one of our house, of course,” he said. “It would have gone ill for the babe if Haru had married Ran, for he has already lost his mother—there is no need for him to suffer so again! But I had promised my daughter to the finest man in the five kingdoms, and it is a sore blow to think I shall have to go hunting for a suitable lord to wed her.”

“Then set your heart at ease, _amarya_ ,” replied Natsuko, who seemed to be fighting a grin. “I know whom our second son-in-law shall be, and I have it in good faith that we will hear of a match for Ren before long.”

Masoto’s jaw hung open for nearly a minute, for this last was too much for the king to bear. At last he shook himself and found voice enough for speech, choking a single word as if it might kill him to hear it aloud.

“ _Who?_ ”

Natsuko answered amidst a gale of laughter from the rest, and when the poor sultan was told of the betrothal contract hidden in Haru’s bedchamber he dropped his head on the table and groaned.

*    *    *

Makoto arose an hour after dawn the next morning, for he was unused to the heat of Sahrastan and could not remain under the sheets for long. He nearly burst into laughter when he opened his eyes, for Ren and Hayato were sprawled across his legs, and Ran was snoring beside him with her head on her brother’s arm—just as they used to do when they were babies of three and four, determined to sleep in his chambers and flout their nurse’s orders.

Once he had freed himself from their arms, he stripped off his nighshirt and rinsed his body in the washroom until the sweat was gone from his chest and back. The water was scented with almond oil, lighter and fresher than the roses and honey that sweetened his baths in Qasr, but still he had learned the fragrance long before he journeyed to the West—for whenever Haru entered a room it blew into the chamber before him, heralding his presence as well as the sound of his feet.

The two had promised to breakfast with the others much later in the morning, but still he could not keep himself from donning a linen tunic and turning the bedroom upside down as he searched for his samite slippers. The ache his breast seemed to have grown tenfold now that they were together again, and in every moment he spent away from his beloved he thought of Haru alone. He bent and kissed the children’s brows before he pulled on his jacket, going to the door on tiptoe and turning back to look at them with a smile before slipping out into the corridor.

“Rin!”

He came to a halt before he could run the advisor off his feet, and Rin took a single glance at his face before bursting into laughter.

“Off to meet with Haru, are you? You are blushing like a maiden, Makoto, so do not think to fool me.”

“Oh, hush,” said Makoto fondly. “Who was it who went about glaring at Rei for a fortnight before you dared admit you were in love with Sakura?”

“We agreed never to speak of it again on pain of death,” threatened Rin. “Where are the others?”

“Still abed,” said the prince. “The children and I share our chambers with Momo, since he is the only one unmarried, and the four of them will not get up until noon. What of Gou and Sei?”

“Sei went off to the training grounds to see if they had any blades to spare, fool that he is,” sighed the advisor. “Gou has better sense, thank Heaven, and she is sleeping still. And Nagisa came to fetch Sakura at dawn, for he wished to show her the dancing hall.”

“Will you come with me to Haru’s chambers, then?”

“Do you mean to wake him?” asked Rin, greatly surprised. “We did not retire until past midnight yesterday, and the sun is hardly risen.”

“Aye, but—”

The younger lad clucked his tongue, grinning up at the prince so that his pointed teeth glittered in the torchlight like a double row of blades.

“ _Smitten_ ,” he teased, tugging at one of Makoto’s ears. “The pair of you shall be thrice as insufferable now that you are betrothed, and I shall not remain with you to see it. Farewell, Makoto! I am going down to the kitchens for breakfast, and perhaps somebody with his wits about him will join me there.”

With that he swung away and disappeared down the steps, leaving Makoto to turn into the passage and make his way to the eastern wing where Haru slept. The royal quarters were on the opposite side of the palace, for they were meant to look out on the desert and the rising sun, while the Qasrian’s lay in the heart of a maze of passages in the southern face of the building. He remembered his way to the princes’ chambers well enough, for the previous night he had parted with them at the door. Before long he was standing in a gilded hallway that ended in stretch of carven mahogany, upon which the likeness of a rearing dragon stood in a wreath of crimson flame.

The dragon’s eye was set with a single star-shaped sapphire, as near a match for the eyes of the Nanase clan as the oceans were to the heavens. He lifted his hand and knocked on the polished wood, smiling softly as he caught the sound of feet hurrying towards him—and then the creak of brass hinges, followed by a flash of twilit blue as the door was finally opened. Makoto cloaked his surprise with a bow, for it was not Haru who greeted him; instead the first of the three brothers stood alone on the threshold, dressed for the day with a copper circlet on his forehead.

“Prince Aki,” he said, touching his hand to his brow in salute. “I did not mean to wake you so early.”

“You came to fetch my cousin, did you not?” asked the Iwatobian, casting a knowing glance at Makoto. “He will not wake until noon at least, lazy thing that he is, and if you rouse him before then he will be cross as a bear for the rest of the day. I am going down to the ring to shoot—will you come with me, Makoto?”

He glanced past Aki’s shoulder and smiled, for against the wall two heads of raven hair were visible beneath a battered quilt. Small Milad was sucking on the hem of Haru’s sleeve as he slept, and though he had longed to see them again Makoto found that he could not bear to wake them.

“Aye, I will.”

With that they went out and down to the first level, where Aki led Makoto to the armory. It was larger by far than the one in the palace of Sardahan, and the soldiers readying themselves to spar stared at the visiting prince with undisguised curiosity in their eyes. The guards were older than the boys who filled the ranks of the infantry in Qasr, or perhaps the younger lads were not obliged to leave their beds so early in the morning. They hailed their liege with salutes and shouted greetings, and a handful who had been sharpening their swords ran off to fetch their archers’ kits the moment Aki ordered a squire to fetch a second bow for Makoto. The prince burst into laughter as a boy with crimson locks stumbled and fell against the dark-haired lad beside him in his hurry to follow their lord. The second boy struggled to his feet with rage in his tawny eyes, turning on his friend with an oath as Aki and Makoto set off down the narrow corridor to the archery pit.

Makoto had scarcely realized how tall Akihiro was until the Iwatobian stepped onto the painted line beside him; the Qasrian was among the greatest in height in the legions of Sardahan, but his companion stood a full hand higher and taller than even the General.  He struck a magnificent figure as he moved across the sand, for the surety in his fluid limbs was the surety of a boy who had grown to manhood with his hand upon a bowstring. It lived in every inch of the prince’s body, from the curl of his pointed fingers to the hair that shone like a rope of serpents shifting their muscles in the sun, both kin and stranger to the strands of inky black that had poured down his cousin’s shoulders in Makoto’s dreams.

Aki cleared his throat as if he wished to speak, but instead he strung his weapon and fired a single shot at the boss shining red and yellow in the distance.

“You know why I brought you here, do you not?” he said, glancing back at the Qasrian a moment later.

“I do,” said Makoto, following suit.

“I love my cousin more than I could hope to say, Lord Amyr,” said the elder prince. “Nineteen years I taught him and guarded him and stood by his side. He took his first steps from my knee, and none has been dearer to me than he is—he is mine, of my blood, and if I came to know he were to be taken from me I should never have let him set one foot out of the palace.”

Makoto said nothing, for he knew the man’s mind well enough. After all, he himself could not have borne to lose his sister—either one prince or the other would have lived with Aki’s pain, and now that the sapphire ring burned bright as the day on Haru’s finger the burden had fallen upon his cousin.

“If ever Haru comes to grief at your hand,” said Aki, “there will be no desert wide enough to conceal you from me, no army mighty enough to shield you—for I will feel his sorrow as I know my own, and pay it forth to you a thousandfold.”

“May death take me ere I bring him sorrow, my lord,” answered Makoto, setting his hand on his heart to pledge his oath in the Western fashion. “He is—he is all that I am, all that I wish, and I could be slain before he shed so much as a tear for my sake.”

For a while they practiced their shooting in silence, pausing now and then to replenish their quivers until the targets were riddled with holes. A handful of Makoto’s had missed their mark, but Aki’s bowmanship was finer than any the prince had seen save Haru’s during the tournament.

“You shoot beautifully,” breathed the Qasrian, turning shining eyes to the elder prince. “I knew it would be so. After all, Haru-chan learned the art from you, did he not?”

“Aye, he did,” said Aki. He lifted his weapon and fired again, squinting after the wooden shaft until it smote the painted target on the other end of the field. “He learned a great deal from me, Lord Amyr, and so did Rei.”

“I owe my life to the knowledge you gave them, _rayish_ ,” said Makoto. “Rei told me that he learned the lore of weaponry from you, and if not for that I would have perished from my wound.”

“That was Rei’s diligence alone, and nothing is owed to me—but I am glad you were healed, Makoto,” replied the other. “I told my beads by the altar night and day, for we had letter after letter from Haru grieving your illness. It seemed that his pain was mine for a while, when he wrote that he could not bear to lose you...even then he loved you more than life, _shahn’Amyr,_ and here in the west we knew it to be so.”

Aki turned away and loosed another arrow, brushing the string as he shot so the barb flew off its track. It seemed he had lost his interest in training, for a minute later he dropped the bow to the ground and stared into Makoto’s face as if searching its depths for falsehood. But whatever he sought it seemed that he could not find it, for he grasped the Qasrian’s wrists and sighed like a gale in the woods.

“Nineteen years I held him close to my side,” he said, looking to the skies as if he had forgotten his companion’s presence. “He was the dearest baby, Makoto! his laughter was lovelier than the breath of a flower, and his eyes were full of light—he worshipped me as I worshipped him, and if I knew we were to be parted I would have made mincemeat of the one who dared to take him from me.”

Makoto glanced up with a frown, and saw that the elder prince was staring down at his hands with a tender look in his eye. It seemed that the Iwatobian had more that he wished to say, and so Makoto kept still and laid his quiver on the sand.

“I taught him to shoot,” murmured Aki. “I taught him to fence and to joust and to dance—but it never brought him joy enough to heal him, and I felt myself worth nothing to see him suffer so. He upheld himself for my sake alone, and it broke me again and again to know it was all for naught.”

“Aki—”

“And then he left my side, _shahn’amyr,_ and set off on a journey without me through the desert that nearly killed him in his childhood. I was nearly sick with fear as I awaited his letters, for the foolish boy knew so little of your speech and even less of your customs. But when he wrote to me he spoke of a child he had taken for his own, and then of a Qasrian prince who had become his friend. By and by his missives grew longer, and granted me knowledge of his heart when for the past eleven years it was locked and bolted before me...and I saw that his wound was beginning to close. I felt his laughter in the ink, in the characters drawn so carelessly where once they were fine and clear, in every sketch that made its way to my hands, of Rei and his betrothed, of Milad—

“And of you, my brother.”

He paused and smiled at the younger prince, putting a hand on his shoulder as if to assure himself that the Qasrian was made of flesh and blood—that the shade had gone from his cousin at last, and would never return again.

“He loves you so dearly, Makoto! perhaps better than either of you know, for while you were ill he bared his feeling to me and said that in three months’ time he had grown to adore you as wholly as he loved me and Rei.”

Makoto saw that his companion’s eyes were full of tears, though he did not know if they were born of joy or sorrow. But at last he began to cry in earnest, clutching the marking-post to keep himself upright as the quiver slipped from his hands.

“I ought—I ought to fall at your knees, _sadh’akhi_ , and thank you with all my heart,” said Aki, his voice nearly choked by his sobs. “I will miss him, every day, but to know—to know he shall have his Heaven with you will be sweeter by far than the sight of his face beside me. And when I see him, whenever the gods see fit to bring us together again—”

“You need not weep, my Lord!” cried Makoto, falling to his knees in the dusty soil and enfolding the prince in his arms. “From the instant we met I worshipped at his feet, and from the moment he was born he worshipped at yours—he will come back to you as often as he likes, for it will not part us at all—I would follow him to the end of time, and break my heart for my happiness all the while!”

*    *    *

“I have done with weddings, Rei.”

“No, you have not,” ordered the steward, dragging Rin down the stairs and shoving him into the midst of the attendants waiting in the chamber below. “We shall need your eye for the last of it, or the hall will go robbed of its beauty.”

Rin complained for nearly an hour before he consented to aid with the remaining preparations for the wedding, but the others knew well enough that his protests were only for show. There was little left to do save the decoration of the feasting hall, which the advisor took on with practiced hands. The manservants giggled behind their fingers when the Qasrian’s back was turned, for he spat and hissed like a firecracker whenever Momo fumbled with the ornaments or shrieked in his brother-in-law’s ear to frighten him. They had never known such merriment while readying the hall for a gathering, and as they went about their duties more than one of them wondered if the young prince’s intended was the same.

Before long the chamber was adorned with garlands of flowers gathered from among the dunes, filling the air with the scents of desert lilies and blossoms broken from the arms of thorny _sabars._ The walls were covered with bolts of silken cloth unrolled and hung from the ceiling, so that the room resembled nothing so much as a pavilion fit for a Queen. Once the silks were in place, Kashi and Momo climbed up to the galleries and lined them with candles, ready to be lit once the wedding rites began. For a while they amused themselves by swinging from the marble balustrades, but Sakura called them down the moment her brother cannoned headlong into a laquered vase and sent it crashing to the floor.

“ _Nee-chan_ ,” grumbled Momo, putting out his tongue at Rin as Sakura took the ropes from his hands. “It was only once—”

“You nearly broke the thing,” she scolded, cuffing him round the ears. “Lend your hand to the kitchens if you must do something, or else you will have the hall in shambles.”

“Oh, very well,” said the lad, who was lying half-buried in a sea of satiny ribbon. “I daresay the cooks will have work for us, so we shall go belowstairs.”

Momo went with good grace and took small Kashi with him, for it had been hours since his breakfast and the party had not yet broken for luncheon. Rin heaved a sigh of relief once his brother-in-law had gone, for now he was free at last to direct the manservants to fetch the baubles made of golden glass to hang amongst the flowers.

The bridegroom himself had not been seen since that morning, for he was closeted in the practice ring with Seijurou and Haru, as well as a handful of generals from the Iwatobian ranks; nobody knew what they were about, and when Makoto questioned his friend at dinner the General only laughed and told his liege to mind his own affairs.

“It is a ceremony of theirs, according to Aki,” he explained, halfway through demolishing a skewer of pork. “And Haru has sworn me to secrecy, so I shall say no more.”

The newly-plighted couple had scarcely a moment to themselves among the preparations for Aki’s wedding, for Haru and Rei were hard at their work from dawn until nearly midnight. The Qasrians had joined them the day after their arrival, for the shadow of their sudden parting had been sorrowful enough that they cared nothing for sweat and toil if it meant that they could keep their friends in sight. But at last the young prince’s burden was lifted when Jun burst into the storage chambers and took over his duties on the third morning, despite the custom that brides ought not to weary themselves before their handfasting.

“Go pass the day with Makoto, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” she smiled, pushing him towards the door. “I will sort the cushions for the temple, if you will say nothing to my father or Mother Kaguya.”

“I shall carry the secret to my grave, my sister,” laughed Haru, swooping down to kiss her cheek. He bundled Milad into his basket and bolted off to the reading halls, where he found Makoto entertaining the prince and princess of Sikandar in Kazumi’s stead. He drew up short at the sight, for both the Makoto and the northerner were somber as a pair of guests had no cause to be before a marriage.

“Lord Yamazaki,” he said, bowing to the dark-haired man in greeting. Lord Yamazaki merely nodded in reply, though his gaze held a gentle welcome; he was many years elder to Haru and Aki, being close upon his thirtieth birthday, but when the lads sought refuge in the north he was only a boy of nineteen and a kindly friend to all three of them at the very worst of their grief.

“ _Ohaiyou,_ Haruka,” replied the prince. “We spoke of this four days ago, did we not—that you are free to call me by name?”

“Aye, we did,” said Haru. “I am glad to see you again, Sousuke.” He turned and saluted Lord Yamazaki’s wife, who laughed and put out a hand to catch the baby tumbling about her feet. “And you, Princess.”

“You came to fetch your intended, did you not?” she giggled. Her son wriggled free of her grasp and tottered round to Haru’s back, grinning up at Milad, who was staring back in earnest. “You have leave to take him, for I fear my boy has grown weary of waiting for his old father to take him to see the chickens.”

“The chickens?” asked Sousuke, lifting an inky eyebrow. “Very well, my son—the chickens it shall be. Farewell, my lords! I shall see you again at supper, I think?”

They nodded and bid the Sikhandhans goodbye before joining hands and going up to a balcony on the seventh level, where a manservant had already set out their luncheon in a basket with a folded blanket and a stack of pillows. The place was deserted save a tiny owl on the balustrade, who turned up his beak at the noise as they entered and flew off toward the dunes.

“What is this place?” asked Makoto, casting his heavy gown to the floor as he took Milad into his arms. “I saw scarcely a soul on the way, and the balcony is nearly a terrace of its own.”

“It was a watch-tower long ago, but for many years it has known only the foolishness of trysting sweethearts,” laughed Haru, shaking out the blanket as Makoto blushed crimson like a rose at his words. “Nobody shall find us here, even if Aki demands my presence belowstairs and sends Jun and Rei to fetch me.”

He turned to glance at his betrothed, and the vision struck him speechless—for Makoto was sitting cross-legged among the cushions with Milad in his lap, humming a Qasrian lullaby as he gazed back at Haru with eyes as tender as the breath of a breeze at dawn. The light of the noonday sun lay wreathed on his brow like a blessing, so that Makoto himself was crowned with a halo of living gold. In all his years the prince had never known a sight so lovely as that, and his own gaze grew softer than silk as he seated himself on the blanket and lay back on Makoto’s knee.

“You are the fairest thing under Heaven, my love,” breathed Haru, gazing up at the beloved face as if learning its beauty anew. He put up a hand and brushed the curve of the Qasrian’s chin, marvelling that the soul he adored had come to know him at all—and that fate had seen fit for the two to meet, caring nothing that one belonged to the East and the second of the pair to the West. Makoto smiled as if he had read the thought and turned his lips to Haru’s palm to kiss it, holding it fast when the Iwatobian flushed and made to draw his hand away.

“Nay, I am not,” Makoto whispered, letting Milad creep away to inspect the sweet-smelling basket. “But it is joy beyond measure, _amarya,_ to know that you think of me so.”

Though he could not tell how it had come to pass, Haru found that they were lying side-by-side and brow to brow, with scarcely a finger’s breadth between their lashes as green-gold eyes met blue. They had passed scarcely an hour together since the day of Makoto’s arrival, and suddenly he longed to return to Sardahan as he had never longed for anything in all his life—to retreat behind shuttered doors with these two whom he loved so dearly, and close out the world in their wake. He reached blindly for Makoto’s hands and saw they were already seeking his own, so that when their fingers touched they met one another half-way—as did their faces a moment later, drawing them into a kiss so sweet that it put ambrosia to shame.

As Makoto sighed into Haru’s cheek the Iwatobian felt as if the breath would bring him to tears, for the prince in his arms was life to his blood as the air was life to his body, and for an instant he wondered how he had lived at all before that summer’s morning so long ago, the day they met in the blooming gardens of Qasr. He shut his eyes as he recalled that first glimpse of brown and shining green, wondering if perhaps he had known what the spirit within them would be to him before the year was out. A gentle palm came up to cradle his face, and somehow he read the words in the touch as if Makoto had spoken aloud.

_Look at me, my heart._

He lifted his lashes and gazed into Makoto’s eyes, which were shining like mossy jewels in the sunlight. Already the salt of the princes’ tears had mingled together on their skin, but neither moved to wipe the drops away—for they were brighter than shaves of diamond for their beauty, as was the marriage of ivory and gold when Makoto bent to kiss him again. For a time it seemed as if the sun itself had vanished behind a veil so as to leave the princes alone, and so they whiled the minutes away until Haru heard a childish giggle and cried out in dismay. Makoto turned and burst into laughter, for small Milad was covered from head to foot in pastry crumbs, and his rosebud mouth was pink and white with powdered sugar.

“Milad!” scolded Haru, taking a cloth and wetting it with the water-syphon. He seized the baby and scrubbed the sugar from Milad’s face, fixing Makoto with a beady stare as the elder boy smothered his guffaws in the pillows. “Doubtless he learned this from you, my love—to eat sweetmeats before his luncheon, without a thought to his appetite.”

The Qasrian said nothing, for that at least was true, and Haru knew it. Milad submitted himself to be washed with poor grace, glaring at the hapless basket as if it were at fault for his woes, but even he could not muster his grimace for long—for the smiles on his fathers’ faces were bright as the day for their power, and so the child beat his hands together and shrieked with glee before he allowed Makoto to feed him a spoonful of porridge.

At length the princes broke their fast and dined on the fare that Jalaluddin had packed for them, noting with some surprise that beside the common fruits and breads and cheeses he had put in a platter of salted pork and onions cooked with honey. Haru had tasted the dish only once before in his life, at his own betrothal feast in Qasr five months ago—for honey was dearer than jade in the West, and rarely spent upon meat.

“This must be for the wedding supper,” he said, frowning down at his bowl. “But _asal’khinzir_ is not known in Iwatobi at all. How could Jalaluddin—”

Makoto cut a morsel of pork and put it between his lips, laughing aloud as the heat of the spices blazed down his throat.

“Momo, that cunning lad,” he said. “He has been more diligent with aiding the kitchens than he ever was with his lessons, and now we know he was thinking of his stomach all the while!”

*    *    *

They passed the remainder of the day on the balcony, dozing now and then on the silken cushions and rousing themselves every hour or so to draw Milad back to the blanket, for every so often an owl or two came up to the balcony to inspect the remains of the princes’ luncheon. Milad was enthralled at the sight of them, and insisted on chasing them round and round until they hooted in reproof and flew away to the dunes to catch their suppers. At length the baby was worn out from running back and forth and went to sleep on Makoto’s chest, for though Haru’s ribs were well on their way to mending the healers had advised him not to strain them.

The princes spoke long into the afternoon, telling one another of all that had passed since their parting twenty-five days before. Often they wept, for the recollections were grave to them both; Haru could scarcely bear to hear of Makoto’s grief on the morning he thought that his heart had been slain, and Makoto buried his face in his palms and sobbed when he heard of the caravan’s meeting with the brigands near the floodplain. He had scarcely breath enough to lift his voice until Haru unlaced his overgown and showed him the wound from whence the blood on the ring had come, already nearly healed save a line of flesh as pink as the sky at sundown. Even Rei’s neat stitches had been taken from his skin long ago, for there was no need of them by the night of the party’s arrival in Iwatobi the week before.

At long last the heavens began to darken, and when Haru and Makoto awoke again they found themselves beneath a stretch of endless black, half-lit by the glow of the moon and stars. They gathered their things and departed the terrace, and before long they were standing at the carven door to Haru’s bedchamber, loath to bid one another farewell as if they would not meet again for a month or more.

“How foolish we are,” murmured Haru, laughing into Makoto’s shoulder as his beloved stooped to kiss him for the seventh time. “It will be only a handful of hours before I see you again, _amarya_ , and then—”

“A handful of hours too many, sweetheart,” came the reply, followed by a kiss at his temple and a second at Milad’s. “We have already been parted too long, and now I think I could not bear to leave your side for so much as a day.”

The door at Haru’s back swung open so swiftly that he nearly fell headlong onto the floor, but instead he stumbled against his cousin and found that the elder boy was laughing so that he could hardly breathe.

“To bed, my brother,” snorted Aki, whisking Milad from Haru’s arms and pushing him in the direction of his wardrobe. “Or you will regret it in the morning, and you know it.”

To Makoto’s surprise the younger lad obeyed without protest, traipsing into the washroom to submit himself to Rei’s rough scrubbing-brush with a look of resignation on his face. The two crown princes bid each other good night before bowing and retreating to their beds, and by the tenth bell the palace was fast asleep—for the guests were weary from their weeks of travel, and the folk of Iwatobi eager beyond measure to speed the night away and welcome the spectacle that awaited on the morrow.

*    *    *

Makoto awoke early the next day, jolted from his dreams by Hayato and the twins leaving their own beds and springing onto his chest all together. He opened his eyes to find them blinking down at him, bouncing on his stomach as they waited for him to stir.

“Onii-chan!” cried Ran. “Get up! Haru-chan came to bid us good morning, and he told us not to wake you until after he had gone.”

“What in Heaven’s name for?” wondered the prince, steadying himself on the mattress as Ren clambered onto his shoulders. “Did he say when he would see us again?”

“No,” sang the little girl, who seemed to know something more than she would tell her brother. She and the little lads buried their faces in their long sleeves and snickered into the yards of silk whenever Makoto turned his back to them, and at the sight of them he thought of how they had demanded to see Haru’s garments and armor before his bouts in the tournament so that they might know him when he came into the ring. He nearly laughed out loud for joy when he recalled that Haru would be with them again at the next festival, though perhaps the Iwatobian need not be named a champion in the coming year—for certainly Makoto could never lift a weapon to his beloved, and it would be the Qasrian’s honor to fight on Haru’s behalf as Haru had fought for his.

“What mischief have the three of you planned for to-day?” asked Makoto, chuckling as Ren and Hayato hurried him into the washroom to bathe. They did not answer, but over the splashing of the water he heard them shrieking with glee in the outer chamber and whispering amongst their mirth until he was dressed and out in the bedroom again.

“Put on your blue gown, Onii-chan!” begged Ran, taking his hands and pulling him to his clothes-chest. “The one with silver spangles at the neck and sleeves—Haru-chan loved it so, don’t you recollect?”

“Certainly I do,” said Makoto, bemused. The blue and silver gown was one of his best and one beloved by both the prince and his intended, but there was nothing that day to suffice as occasion to wear it. “But I have only worn it thrice or four times before, and today—”

“Put it on!” demanded Hayato, rooting through the closet until he had found the hapless robe and shaken out of its brown-paper wrappings. “Everyone shall be dressed in their finest things, and you are the prince of Qasr!”

The door burst open before Makoto found voice for a further protest, admitting the assorted Matsuokas and Mikoshibas into the chamber with Kisumi and Miya behind them. They were clad in festival robes embroidered with gold and silver thread, and Makoto was only further bewildered at the sight.

“What upon earth are the lot of you doing, dressed so?” he asked. “The wedding is two days from now, and—”

“Put on your gown, Makoto,” laughed Seijurou, taking the thing from Hayato’s hands and stuffing it into Makoto’s arms. “And the very best of your gold and sapphires, for to-day’s ceremony is nearly as weighty as the marriage itself.”

Makoto did as he was told, permitting Sakura and Rin to choose his jewels and circlet with wonder bursting like a firework in his breast. Once he was ready they took him by the hand and hurried down to the lower levels, where he had gone with Aki three days before to practice his archery. The Qasrians passed by the door to the armory and bolted beneath the portcullis to the practice ring with Makoto at their heels, chattering at the tops of their voices as Kisumi and Ren tugged the prince to the stands. There they found Rei and Nagisa sitting together, with a bowlful of dates baked into pastry and Milad perched on Nagisa’s knees.

“Rei!” cried Makoto, clasping the steward’s hand in relief. “You at least—have the goodness to tell me what is afoot, I beg of you—”

“It is the first of the Western customs before a marriage,” explained Rei. “The bridegroom must prove his worth to wed his love by vanquishing a second suitor in combat, and all the men of the nobility must do so before they can wed.”

“ _Ha_ s Jun a second suitor?” asked the prince, greatly surprised. “Haru told me that she and Aki had given their word to wed one another before his seventh birthday.”

“I pity his lordship’s rival for the maiden’s hand in marriage,” said Momo, chiming in like a bell. “Haru said that the prince has loved her Grace since the both of them were children, and the word in the kitchens is that the second champion once sought to win the Lady Jun for himself.”

“Truly?” asked Rin, leaning across his sister so he might look at Rei. “Who was it?”

“I know not,” said the steward, shrugging his shoulders. “But Aki has been training night and day to best him, and if he is defeated he shall have to challenge his opponent again.”

“That is why you were with him in the practice ring,” realized Makoto, turning to Sei. “You were aiding him with his training.”

“Aye, he wished to learn some of the Qasrian tricks in hand-to-hand combat,” explained the general. “Haru and I aided him as best we could, but we had little time.”

“He will have learned it all, my lord.” assured Rei. “There is not a finer swordsman in the kingdom, Makoto—the bout is little more than ceremony to him, and certainly he will earn the right to marry his betrothed.”

“Where is Haru?” asked Kisumi, squinting like an owl over the sea of heads. “Ought he not to be with us?”

“He is with Aki, as his second-in-command,” said Nagisa, bouncing Milad in his lap. The baby giggled and put up a hand to grasp the dancer’s veil, tugging curiously at the embroidered satin until Makoto took him into his own arms.

“Want, Papa,” said the child, pointing solemly to the patterned silk that cascaded down Nagisa’s back. He was the only one of the Qasrian lads to wear a veil over his hair, for by custom men went bareheaded in the East, but the boys of the dancers’ guilds had long since chosen to don a filmy shawl on their heads to mark their standing.

“Join the dancer’s guild when you are grown, and you shall have as many as you like,” chuckled Nagisa, taking the baby’s fists in his hand and pretending to eat them as Makoto had often done in Sardahan.

Makoto paid little mind to Milad’s babbling, for his eyes were drifing back and forth down the chamber without heed to what they found. At last they lit on the garlanded box where Hiromasa and his brother sat with the princess and the Queen, dressed in robes of black and crimson samite with golden bands in their hair.

“Rei,” he said, looking back at the younger lad. “All the men I have seen in Iwatobi wear their hair as long as a maiden’s, save perhaps two or three of the council—why is it then that you and Haru keep yours cut short?”

The steward sighed and put his chin in his palm, leaning out over the balustrade as he stared at the door at the southern end of the arena.

“Haru told you of what troubled him with the _ahen_ on the day he nearly drowned, did he not?”

“Aye, he did—of the first drought in the West eleven years ago, and the Queen Suhaila’s passing.”

“Our heads are to remain unshorn as long as we live, as part of the Western vow to the Goddess,” Rei explained. “But it custom to cut our locks as close as can be when mourning a death, and Aki burned off my hair and Haru’s for the Queen whilst we were living in Sikandar. Haru refused to let his grow long again, for in his eyes it would be insult to his grandmother to do so—and as his servant I kept mine short, to honor my lord until he saw fit to mourn no longer.”

“And Aki?”

“He is the elder brother, and so he was not obliged to grieve for his brother’s sake,” explained Rei.

Makoto opened his mouth to question him further, but a moment later a chorus of music rang out from the boxes below. A squadron of trumpets were sounding their notes as loudly as ever they could, and the ladies covered their ears at the noise until the horns were lowered—all excepting Sakura, who leaned over the rail to see them better until Rin tugged her back for fear she would fall.

Once the horns had died away, a shower of of paper streamers fell down from the rows above— dyed in all colors of the rainbow, red and green and sunset orange and the blue of a twilit sky. The children danced hither and yon between the benches to catch them, and only Milad narrowed his stormy eyes and peered down at the iron grates in the ring: one on either side, parted at once to reveal a pair of soldiers walking bareheaded into the field. One of course was Aki, clad in a shirt of silvery mail with a leather jerkin beneath. He wore neither helm nor armor save for a pair of gauntlets, and his hair shone bright as a polished mirror on its path from his brow to his waist. It seemed as if he had combed his tresses with oil, for not even a strand was curled out of place, and Makoto thought for a second time of the glassy scales shining black as tar on the skins of desert serpents.

The second soldier stood a full head shorter than the first, and though his arms were guarded only by a leather sleeve he wore a golden hauberk over his chainmail. His hair was a match for his opponent’s in hue, though where Aki’s nearly brushed his hip the younger man’s came only to the base of his neck. He smiled up at the stands as he passed, and the Qasrians drew in a delighted breath as the Western princes met and bowed in the dusty centre of the field.

“Haru-chan!” cried Ran, clapping her hands together before plumping Milad into Nagisa’s lap so that she might sit on her brother’s. “He looks lovely, doesn’t he?”

Makoto laughed and shook his head at the little ones, for he ought to have known that Haru would be the challenger the moment he heard that Aki would have to earn his right to Jun’s hand.

“ _Did_ he ask to marry her, then?” he asked, recalling the rumor in the kitchens with a grin.

“Aye, he did,” chuckled Rei. “Haru and I were devoted to Jun when we were little lads, and we cried for nearly half a day when Aki said she loved him the best. Both of us asked for her hand in marriage when we were babies of three, and so Haru was the only nobleman in the court besides Aki who ever dared seek to wed her.”

“Hush!” cried Gou. “Hold your tongues, both of you. They are about to begin.”

Makoto and Rei fell silent and stared down into the ring, for amongst the cheers the princes had gone to the flowered seat between the two doors and knelt in the sand before it. Jun was sitting in the box alone, dressed to the teeth in flowered silk and covered from brow to ankle in jewels. She did not lower her eyes to the men at her feet, staring away at the stands instead as if she did not see them at all. Hiromasa lifted his hand from the row where he sat with his brother, and the gaiety in the crowd was smothered at once like a flame dying out in a gale. Jun’s father stood beside him with his wife, adorned in a robe with a robe of purple satin stitched from hems to collar with the emblem of his house—the six-pronged star of the Kirishima clan, which Makoto had seen three days previously on the helm of Jun’s younger cousin Natsuya. Hiromasa gave him a nod at his right, and once the wings grew quiet at last he lifted his voice and began to speak.

“Two years ago I promised my daughter in marriage to the eldest son of the royal house,” he said, looking down at Aki and Haru. “They were betrothed in the fashion of our people, but the prince Akihiro has not yet proved himself a man with might enough to take my Jun for his wife. Thus I call upon him to defeat a challenger of equal strength and standing in my daughter’s name, so her mother and I may surrender our child to a husband worthy of her love.”

“Do you accept these terms, my son?” asked Hiromasa, allowing his gaze to settle on Aki’s face.

“I do, my Lord,” answered the prince, turning and saluting in the direction of the emperor’s row. “I have loved the Lady Jun from my childhood, and I would gladly do battle before a crowd of thousands to win her.”

“And you, Prince Haruka,” said Lord Kirishima, fixing Haru with a beady stare. “What claim have you in the eyes of the court to fight for my daughter’s hand?”

“I have known her and loved her since I was little more than a babe, my Lord,” said the younger lad. “I was the first to seek her heart, before her favored suitor, and so I have cause to challenge him and best him if I may.”

Haru’s words were gentle and mild where his cousin’s speech had been bold, and Makoto knew at once that his intended’s voice was a carefully crafted artifice: meant to harden his brother’s resolve as the worthier champion, and sway the crowd to dismiss Haru himself as unfit to have Jun for his bride.

“What say you, Lady Jun?” asked Hiromasa, favoring the girl with a kindly smile. “Do you accept these two lads for your suitors, my daughter?”

“Aye, I do,” she said, permitting Haru and then Aki to kiss the crimson gem that winked in the setting of her betrothal ring. “They are both known to me, Highness, and both are dear to my heart.”

“And which holds your favor, _shin’ainaru-ko?_ ”

“The Prince Akihiro, my Lord.” The maiden’s cheeks grew rosy as if she were nearly too timid to speak her sweetheart’s name, but this was for the sake of the court alone; a moment later she glanced down and shot Aki a wicked grin, so swift in its motion that Makoto scarcely saw it at all.

“So be it,” declared Lord Kirishima. “Ready yourselves, my sons.”

Aki and Haru turned to face one another and bowed for a second time, laying their gauntleted palms over their hauberks before drawing their blades from the scabbard. For a minute they stood together as if awaiting a signal, and all of the folk in the stands caught their breath at the sight. They were beautiful together, Makoto thought, and not even by the lack in Haru’s height and the slenderness of his body could he be taken for the lesser of the pair; the muscles in his neck and shoulders were smaller than Aki’s, but still they were hardy and strong like a bowstring drawn for the shot. Somehow the Qasrian remembered his own father and mother at the sight, though he could not fathom why—or else he did not know either of them well enough to understand the vision that flashed before his eyes, for the picture was cast away from his mind the moment the bronzen gong rang out from the chamber above and threw the princes headlong into battle.

*    *    *

Haru had learned the art of weaponry at his cousin’s knee, though he remembered nothing of it as he grew from youth to manhoood: much to Sasabe’s grief, for the small prince saw little use in lore when it had no worth in the field. Haru had been a gifted swordsman almost from the day that Aki first led him to the practice ring, but although he knew that the infantry favored the _hebiken_ whilst the cavalry fought with rapiers he never cared to learn why.

But still he was no stranger to the unearthly bond between weapon and master, witnessed first when he was a baby of three watching Aki play with a practice-blade. There was a catlike grace behind Aki’s movements, if catlike it could be called. His strength was better compared to the might of a hunting tiger, wedded with breathless beauty as the elder prince began his training and rose through the ranks like the Southern wind. Aki’s blades were as bold and bright and keen as the prince himself, and often too heavy for Haru to lift. The crossguards sloped back towards the pommel rather than up towards the fuller, for Aki’s swords were meant to bury themselves to the hilt in his quarry’s flesh; he had no need of the crossguards to keep his hold on the grip, for the power of his shoulders was enough and more to rip his weapons free.

Mighty they were, both sword and prince, and yet not one of his blades went forth to the ring without the touch of grace. Even the cheapest weapons were adorned from tip to handle, inlaid with silver against the steel and painted with costly enamelling all down the length of the scabbard—as lovely to see as their dark-haired lord, who would not set foot out of his chambers without rubies and gold at his neck and a samite gown on his shoulders. Haru had often laughed at him for it in their childhood, but the ornaments suited his cousin like sunlight suited the dawn, and he hardly seemed himself without them.

The younger prince had always known his place as the second brother, and never in all his life had he sought to rise above his station. He spent his days content in the marble palace of Sahrastan, running after Aki at all he did until he was old enough to follow in his cousin’s footsteps. It was thus that Haru’s _kaskara_ was as much a mirror for Aki as it was for Haru himself, for often it seemed that one had been poured in the other’s image, as if neither could live without his brother’s presence hovering in the light beside him. Now they were split where they had once been nearly a single soul, for their paths no longer lay side by side as they always promised to be. Aki was to remain in the West as its king, while Haru would rule from Sardahan in the east with Makoto some day.

But even in their youth they were different from one another as the dark was unlike to a star, and as they grew from boys to men they were only parted the further. Haru’s hair was cropped to his neck where Aki’s hung free to his waist; Aki’s blue eyes danced and sparkled like flames as he spoke, while Haru’s were soft and still like the gleam of a silent pool. Haru was small and narrowly built, taking after the clan from whence his grandfather had come. But Aki’s height surpassed even the tallest men in Qasr, for he and his father were the image of the Queen Suhaila—as she was when she walked in the West long ago, greater in strength than the men of her ranks and born to govern a nation.

Haru thought of the tournament in Sardahan as he took his saber from the sheath, bringing the blazon of golden lilies to the light of the morning sun. His blade was narrower than his cousin’s, suited for one-handed combat while Aki fought with a two-handed _hebiken_ , but the elder prince’s strength was such that he could heft the thing in a single palm.

Haru scarcely needed to think at all as the match waxed up to its peak, for he and Aki had practiced together until they could spar with their eyes shut tight against the rising sand. All he knew was that his cousin wearied quicker in battle than he had done of old, for the silver-steel Balmung was not fit for sparring—and Haru slowed his pace as Aki began to tire, for though his arm was nearly healed the folk in the crowd did not know it. The end was rehearsed as the rest of the fight had been, and when the bridegroom disarmed his brother they had hardly broken a sweat.

A chorus of shouts rose up in the wings, and as the two princes shook hands at the centerfield they heard Rei and Nagisa whooping themselves hoarse in the stands. Haru went forth first to kneel at his sister’s feet, laughing breathlessly as she lifted him up and kissed his brow. Once he had saluted her a second time he drew away to the side, watching as she rose from her chair and permitted her betrothed to clasp her in his arms.

“You have proved your might, Akihiro,” came Lord Kirishima’s voice, thundering over the shrieks of the crowd. It quieted at once as he spoke, and after the two lovers saw fit to loosen their embrace they went to Jun’s parents hand-in-hand, where at last they were given leave to marry before the eyes of all the city.

*    *    *

The afternoon sun found Haru and Makoto sitting together on the seventh-floor terrace, lying on a battered quilt with Milad running circles about them. The young owlets on the balustrade had decided that the little lad was a kindred spirit, for Milad had learned to leave them to themselves save to feed them the dried-meat rinds that Jalaluddin had given him earlier that morning. But still the birds dared not linger for long, for the child and his guardians were not alone on the terrace; the visiting Qasrians had filled up the place from door to rail, shouting with mirth and dashing here and there as their laughter floated between the pillars and down to the streets below.

Aki and Jun escaped the revelry in the practice ring and slipped away to join them as soon as they were able, running like the wind for fear they should be seen. Rei and Nagisa appeared a moment later with Kashi swinging between them, completing the party as Aki shut the doors so that nobody else might follow them.

“Now we are all here!” cried Nagisa, diving onto Rin’s back the moment his pointed slippers cleared the threshold. The advisor choked and fell forward onto Haru’s stomach, gasping for breath as the children shrieked with glee and flattened the golden-haired dancer beneath them.

“Get up!” he croaked, wriggling like a worm as Haru fixed him with a steely glare. “I thought I should be spared your foolishness now that we are in the West—the more fool I, to hope it!”

“ _Nagisa,_ ” chided Sakura, hoisting her comrade up by the neck of his robe and setting him on the ground again. “Off, at once.”

“What shall we do now?” asked Ran, lifting Haru’s eyelid by the lashes. “We cannot spend all the day up here, Haru-chan!”

“Aye, we can,” said Haru obstinately, turning away from the little girl and burying his face in Makoto’s shoulder. Makoto laughed and wrapped his beloved in his arms, putting out a hand to draw Ran and Hayato to his side as Ren nestled close to Haru’s back and fell asleep at once.

“There is the _lauha_ tonight,” sighed Aki, lying back against his cousin’s knee as Kashi jumped into his lap. “We shall have to go and bathe before long, Haru.”

“The _lauha?_ ” asked Gou, opening a curious eye to gaze up at the Iwatobian.

“Aye, one for the men and one for the ladies,” said Rei. “Jun will have hers in her own chambers, and we will have Aki’s in one of the lesser feasting halls.”

“But what _is_ it?” she persisted, rolling upright and tossing her pillow at the steward. “I have never heard of such a thing before.”

“You shall see, _zahraya_ ,” smiled Jun, who had taken a great liking to the younger girl. “You and Miya and Sakura are welcome to come if you wish.”

Jun had sorely missed a woman’s company all her life, having been raised with Aki and Haru for the better part of her childhood. She was the only maiden of her household in the estate where she dwelled from her thirteenth year to her twentieth, and so she was nearly gladder to befriend Sakura and Gou than to meet her brother’s intended.

“Aye, we will,” crowed Miya, who sat at Kisumi’s right. “I thank you, Lady Jun.”

The four women departed the terrace not long after that, taking little Ran with them to prepare for the evening ceremony; Ren and Hayato nearly burst into tears as she vanished into the corridor, but Aki leveled a quelling glance at the pair of them and stilled the lads in their tracks. Men were not given leave to witness the ladies’ _lauha,_ not even the bride’s intended—but Jun’s mother was to join the girls at her quarters with the princess and the queen, along with a handful of guests from Ram-Susah and Sikandar.

The boys were left behind on the balcony to watch the birds, but at last Rei groaned from the bottom of the heap of bodies where he lay and squinted up at the sun. He shook Kashi and Ren from his back before clambering up to his feet, jolting Rin and Kisumi from the arms of a tranquil slumber.

“We ought to go belowstairs, Aki,” he said, prying Nagisa off Makoto’s legs. “Or else the artists will not have time enough to finish, and—”

“Aye, I am coming,” sighed Aki. “Will the rest of you accompany me, then?”

Rei’s presence and Haru’s were called for at the ceremony as well as the bridegroom’s, but the others were far too weary of their quarters to forgo the night’s entertainment. The party split in two for an hour or so when the Iwatobians went down to bathe, and the easterners betook themselves to the kitchens and drove the cook nearly out of his wits. But at last the gong in the entrance hall struck the seventh bell, and before the eighth the whole of the band was assembled in one of the feasting chambers together.

Makoto and Seijurou were tall enough to see over the heads of the gathering, and from where they stood by the southern wall they glimpsed Jun’s dark-eyed cousins hovering at Nagisa’s right, accompanied by a slender guardsman with a gaze as green as grass: an uncommon hue in the West, or so Haru and Aki had said. The lad’s hair was grey like a mist of shifting cloud, and when Lady Kirishima’s elder son observed Makoto’s curious glances he put his arm round the young man’s waist and drew him close to his side. The second brother threw up his hands and sighed, glaring daggers at Natsuya’s back before he turned and vanished into the crowd.

“What is that lad’s name?” asked Makoto, looking back the way the boy had gone. “He was a fine archer, that one. I saw the boy when I first went down to the ring, but I never heard how they called him.”

“Ikuya by birth, I think,” answered Sei. “I have never seen a greater spitfire save Rin, and it troubles Natsuya to no end.”

“You sparred with them whilst Aki was training for the match, did you not?”

“Aye, and the child is filled to the brim with ire,” grumbled the general. “He cannot be older than eighteen, but still he is as bitter as a man of eighty with his brother. Natsuya is only lately returned to the city, and Ikuya missed him terribly in his absence. But before he journeyed back from the North he wed the family’s ward without sending word to his father—just as Kisumi did, and Ikuya did not forgive it.”

“What of the lady, then? Surely the boy has not been unkind to her?”

“The ward is that young man there,” chuckled Sei, pointing to the green-eyed soldier clasped in Natsuya’s arms. “Kirishima Nao in the Western fashion, as his bridegroom so gladly informed me.”

Makoto parted his lips to reply, but an instant later the room fell quiet as Haru shouted over the bedlam in the pointed accents of the Iwatobian speech. The men pressed back to the walls at the cry, leaving an empty ring in the center of the chamber where three wooden chairs stood side-by-side on a fraying tarpaulin. Rei sat cross-legged on the first with Aki enthroned beside him, and after the others had cleared the way Haru took his place on the last.

They put their hands to their bone-white collars and unclasped their linen robes, letting them fall to the icy floor as Hiromasa and Tamotsu came forth from the crowd. The emperor and his brother were accompanied by a manservant, a wise-looking fellow perhaps three years younger than Tamotsu with skin as white as Haru’s. The attendant was dressed in a robe of embroidered satin and crowned with a silver band, and Makoto thought of how Rei had looked at the betrothal feast as Anuka in the summer. Even the old manservant’s eyes were known to Makoto and Seijurou, for they were a piercing violet, and a pair of crimson spectacles sat against the pale skin of his nose—he was the very image of his son, and brought up alongside the two monarchs as Rei was raised with the princes.

“Is that Rei’s father, then?” whispered Rin, who had wrestled his way through the crowd to stand beside his brother-in-law. “The two are alike as peas in a pod, though the elder one is dark-haired.”

“Aye, it is,” chirped Momo. The young dancer was clinging to Seijurou’s sleeve, nearly dislodging Kashi and Ren from his burly shoulders. The general looked down and sighed at the sight of him, permitting small Kashi to slide to the floor and slip behind Makoto’s legs.

“Look,” breathed the prince, setting a hand on his advisor’s arm. “That is paint, is it not?”

The king and the prince were kneeling before their sons, and on the tiles between them there sat a bowl of dark-brown ink with a row of short-haired brushes. Rei’s father joined them a moment later, and once he had taken his place the three men took their brushes in hand and wet them through with paint before setting the color to Aki’s skin.

As the minutes went by the guests began to chatter again, and the younger lads from the guard crowded up to stand with the princes and watch the men at their work. Makoto and Rin nearly lost their breath at the beauty of it, for plains of fruit and flowers had bloomed like the spring upon Haru’s arms, while Rei’s pale calves were covered with the very reflection of the skies at midnight—dark with planets and painted suns, and each one embellished with sparking rays no wider across than a hairsbreadth.

But finest of all was Aki, who was dressed only in a pair of trousers cut short at the knee to spare his paint from smudging. His right arm was emblazoned with a snarling dragon, lying with its jaws on the back of his hand and the point of its tail on his shoulder; Hiromasa was half-way through the task of coloring the scales with a paste of powdered gold, so that every inch of the bridegroom’s skin was afire like a cloud at sunrise. Tamotsu had drawn a peacock spreading its tail on the opposite arm, tinting the beak with the dragon’s gold and the blue-eyed feathers with the hues of lapis and malachite—but lovelier still were the peacock’s eyes, in which violet and green had been married with indigo round a circle of inky black.

The prince’s long feet were adorned with both the Iwatobian crest and his own, scattered across with ternions of diamonds for the stars on the Western flag; this last was the work of Lord Ryuugazaki, whose steady hands were sketching still so that Aki’s toes looked as if they were wreathed in flame. On his breast was the rearing horse of the Kirishima clan, drawn with its tail flying back in a breeze and an auburn mane for the shade of the bride’s dark hair; this was Jun’s own sigil as it had been from her childhood, but upon the day of her wedding it would be changed to the likeness of a hunting gyrfalcon. She had chosen the sign herself not long before her betrothal, as the custom was in Iwatobi—and this last was the final ornament on Aki’s well-muscled flesh, lying between the vales of his ribs and directly above his heart.

Haru and Rei had been finished with long ago, and now they were walking in circles round their elder brother and swinging their arms in the draft so as to dry their paint. By and by the three men put down their brushes and groaned as they rose to their feet, shaking the knots from their necks and backs before calling a steward to open the second window.

“There, it is done,” sighed Hiromasa. “What do you think, my lad?”

“ _Shukraan,_ Father,” breathed Aki, staring down at the _lauha_ as if it might disappear the moment he shut his eyes. “I have never seen a finer one than this in all my life.”

“All our hopes go forth with you, child,” said Lord Ryuugazaki, bending to brush the top of Aki’s head. “I hope it is to your liking, and to your lady wife’s on the wedding day.”

The walls rang out with laughter at the blush on the bridegroom’s face, and with that the gathering drew to a close as the guests filed off to their beds. Nao and Natsuya Kirishima were the first to depart, vanishing into the torchlit corridor with Ikuya sloping along at their heels. The lad’s redheaded friend took his leave a moment later, catching Ikuya by the end of his sleeve and pulling him away from his brother.

After the rest of the guard cleared off, Momo was found fast asleep in a corner with Ren and Hayato stretched across his legs and Kashi curled up on his stomach. The dancer was relieved of his burden before long, for Phina bounced into the chamber after leaving the ladies’ _lauha_ and trudged away with her wayward brother thrown limply over her shoulder. At last only the princes were left in the room with Rei and the eight Qasrians, sighing like the wind as they poked at the paint to see if the stuff had dried. The darker paint would peel away from their skin, leaving a deep-brown stain behind—but the colors were to remain in place, and nothing save soap and hot water could dislodge them.

“It suits you marvellously, _amarya_ ,” murmured Makoto, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor with Haru lying in his lap. The Iwatobian had nearly surrendered to byelow himself, soothed to the brink of slumber by the touch of Makoto’s fingers as they slipped like silk through his hair. “I would dearly love to see you wear it for our own wedding-day, my love.”

“And what of you?” yawned Haru, putting up a hand to trace the curve of Makoto’s cheek. “Both of us needs must be painted for the handfasting, or neither one—and it is not the custom in Qasr, I know.”

“Then it shall be so from this moment forth,” smiled the elder prince, bending down to kiss him. “For you look like a garden in Zahr’al-Adar, and I should like to match you in the spring.”

Nagisa snickered into Milad’s sooty curls, which lay limp and dark on the baby’s forehead as he snored on the dancer’s shoulder. The child had gone to sleep without his supper, and already Haru knew that he would be woken before long to fetch the little lad a draught of milk from the kitchens.

“I brought a bowl of _shahals_ up to our quarters before luncheon,” called Rei, who had seen the weariness in his brother’s face. “And there is a bowl of milk for Milad, if he should wake before breakfast-time.”

Haru nodded his thanks and took his small son into his arms, tramping off to the eastern wing with Makoto behind him. Before long the chamber was wholly empty, save for the shawl that Rin had forgotten on the windowsill—and all the palace asleep, awaiting the joining of a prince and princess on the morrow.

*    *    *

Haru and Aki did not bathe that evening, and neither did Rei; the three lads had scrubbed their bodies from head to foot earlier in the day, so that they need not spoil their fathers’ handiwork until the wedding was over and done with. They went to bed almost as soon as their feet crossed the threshold of their quarters, donning their lightest shirts and breeches before flinging themselves on their pillows—but Nagisa spent nearly an hour in the washroom, soaking to his heart’s content in Aki’s long tub until the water grew cold. Once he had dressed himself he stumbled away to Rei’s room and fell on the cot by the steward’s mattress, sinking into a dreamless sleep the moment his head struck the cushion.

But he did not shut the door in his wake, and so his intended awoke at once at the creak of a bedspring in the chamber beyond. Rei sat up and rubbed his eyes before groping on the nightstand for his spectacles; it was a minute or more until he found them, for the round circles of glass had been lying half-buried in the folds of Nagisa’s veil. He put them on and went out to his brothers’ room, which was awash from top to bottom with the silver light of the stars. The silken drapes at the floor-length window were flying back in the wind, betraying the presence of the dark-haired prince who ought to have been asleep in the bed by the northern wall.

Rei gathered his mantle closer round his shoulders and looked out onto the balcony, where Haru shone like the marble figure of a god as he sat on the curving balustrade. He was clad in nothing more than his tunic and trousers, and yet his limbs stood firm against the chill as he bent his head to the sketching-pad on his lap. Rei let his cheek fall back to the carven pillar by the door, his eyes growing soft as he saw how beautifully his brother had grown to manhood.

In their years together the world had sought to shatter them time and again, first in the searing heat of the desert where they warred with the arms of death—and for so long afterwards, whilst Haru fought with his grief alone and devoted his life to the kingdom that had fallen nearly to pieces beneath him. Peril by fire, by fire again: Haru and Rei had braved them all, and built up their hearts from the ashes anew. Even the worst of their sorrow had never been borne alone, for whether Aki stood beside them or not he cheered them on from afar.

At the sound of the steward’s footsteps Haru turned to face him with eyes as tranquil and fair as the sea, sweetened by the portrait that shone halfway to loveliness under the grace of his careful hands. The lines were dark in the pearly moonlight, six inches down and five across, and though for a moment they seemed sharp and strange he found that he knew them at once. Bronze and raven feathers mingled together like the tides on the sheet of vellum, tracing a figure that the lads had known and loved from their youth—the flaming likeness of a golden eagle, spreading its wings as if it would come forth from the page. A hint of green blossomed by its feet, and Rei saw that it stood on the boughs of a desert willow, as fresh and bold as the woods that grew in Qasr.

“My coat of arms,” murmured Haru, brushing the raptor’s claw with a tender finger. “For after my wedding—I must have a new one, and this was the best I could think of.”

Rei said nothing, for at the sight of it he caught his breath and began to weep—at this last proof that the shadow had passed, that joy had returned to the cobalt eyes that had always been beside him—that the second prince of Iwatobi was himself again after longer than the steward cared to recall, brought back to life by the power of the East and free to bloom at last, like the buds of the greening spring for which his parents had named him.

“Beautiful,” he sobbed, reaching for Haru’s elbow and enfolding the prince in his arms. “Oh, _shin’ainaru-ko_ , how glad I am for you!”

They remained there for a moment longer before the whisper of satin bedclothes came from the chamber behind them, and Aki stumbled out to the balcony with his blankets trailing in his wake. It was the end of a life, they knew—the next day Aki would leave their quarters for ever, taking his place beside his wife as he had longed to do since the day he and Jun first met as a pair of unruly children seventeen years ago. Rei would be wed to Nagisa a fortnight after that, and in the coming spring—

That night was both sorrow and revelry to them all, and as they stood hand-in-hand by the balustrade they spoke of all they had learned and loved in their childhood until the tears ran forth like rain down their cheeks. It would not be long now before they were changed, and yet they would remain as they had always been, the dearest treasures of Iwatobi—laughter and grace and valor as one, despite the leagues that would lie between them. At length they withdrew to their chambers and returned to their beds, falling into slumber again as they dreamed of all they had known in the past and all they were to cherish in the days to come.

*    *    *

Haru was woken the next morning at the crack of dawn, jolted from sleep by a pair of tiny hands poking at his side. He opened his eyes and smiled down at his squealing son, who seemed to know perfectly well what the day would bring; often the child cried out in protest when his guardians took him from his crib, but it seemed that today he had climbed from the high-barred cot alone.

“Get _up_ , Haru-chan!” shrieked Nagisa, who was chasing his intended hither and yon down the chamber with a dripping washcloth. “How can you lie abed to-day?”

“Aye, he speaks wisely,” said Aki, plucking the towel from Nagisa’s fingers. “Arise, _shin’ainaru-ko!_ or there shall be no wedding, for the bridegroom will find himself slain by his own _okaa-san_ for his lateness.”

“Very well, very well,” sang the younger prince, dancing away to the washroom to brush his teeth and Milad’s. The proceedings were somewhat delayed when Milad tried to eat the stick of neem that Haru had split for him, but before long both father and son were refreshed and ready for the day. The four boys partook of their breakfast before dressing, and as the custom was on feasting-days they ate only a little; there was a bowl of watered rice-porridge apiece, spiced with peppers and a bit of salt pork. Once they had eaten they sent down the dishes, and the three Iwatobians touched their paint with almond oil to keep its sheen through the ceremonies.

“Now to dress,” Rei announced. Haru obeyed without a word and went to his cupboard, in which his gown for the handfasting was hung in a linen bag. He unbuttoned the clasps and shook the garment out upon the bed, catching his breath at its beauty as Nagisa cried out in wonder behind him.

The sparkling tunic was a meld of three colors: gold, white, and red. The cloth itself was a cream-colored brocade, woven with a pattern of blooming _zahras_ in gold—but upon the left shoulder the Iwatobian sigil for fortune was sewn onto the fabric beneath a layer of yellow pearls. It fell straight as a rod from the close-pinned velvet collar, gathering three inches beneath Haruka’s knee, where a second row of tiny pearls had been stitched through the braid at the hem. A strip of tufted crimson began at the prince’s throat and ran from neck to hip, lying beside a line of buttons wrought from golden filigree—filigree set with gemstones at their hearts, redder than blood and bright as a bonfire.

“Put it on!” cried the dancer, staring agape at the scarlet slashes in the sleeves. He marveled aloud at the tasselled belt as Haru drew on the tunic over his chemise, setting it over the deep-red trousers that clung like a skin to his legs. Rei took the girdle from his master’s hands and wrapped it round his waist, tying it shut with a lover’s knot so the tassels streamed down to his thigh.

“Now you, _rouhiya_ ,” said the steward, fighting like a soldier with the flush in his cheeks as Aki began to snicker. He went into his own room and returned with the gown that Miho had altered for Nagisa, a cheerful affair of beaded gauze with a purple-red chemise beneath. The tassels on the waistband were strung with pieces of crystal, and once Nagisa had fastened the clasps he spun in a joyful circle to hear the clicking of the gems.

Rei’s gown was darker than his brother’s and cut to the same length as Haru’s, but his collar slanted across the chest and closed with clasps made of satin where Haru’s was pinned at the throat. The robe had been cut from layered silk and dyed black with the flesj of gallnuts, and beneath the light of the morning sun it shone like a film of water. The tunic was fully embroidered and hemmed in rich purple thread, feathering over the inky brocade like afternoon clouds across a summer sky. The breeches were looser than Nagisa’s, rippling freely down from his knees and fluttering in the draft that wove through the air by his ankles.

The steward turned his attention to Aki after the younger three were dressed, aiding the prince as he slipped on the long-skirted undergown over his dark-red trousers. The outer robe was longer than the others’, falling past Aki’s calves and leaving eight inches of crimson silk from the chemise beneath them. The garment did not have a belt, but in place of a girdle the crown prince carried a satin shawl made of scarlet cloth on one side and golden on the other. The tassels dangling from the borders were made of gold and rubies, and if Haru had delayed but an instant the finest of the stones would have vanished down small Milad’s throat.

“ _Radhiy!_ ” he scolded, tucking the baby under his arm as Rei went off to fetch their jewels. “One would think I never feed you at all—first you swallowed a handful of soap, and now Aki’s gemstones. Is there anything you would not eat, my heart?”

“ _Saba_ ,” said Milad solemnly, reciting the Iwatobian word for mackerel. His accent was beyond reproach, and at the weary look that stole over Haru’s face his brothers burst into laughter.

“He is wiser than he looks,” hooted Nagisa, clasping a strand of garnets round his throat. “That is right, Milad-chan—you must never permit your _mama_ to eat mackerel again, for everybody knows he is fond of it.”

“Oh, hush,” grumbled the prince. He groped about in the rosewood box and withdrew with a pair of thin gold bracelets, which he slid onto his wrists before poking about for a pendant to lie between the two panels of his collar—but he did not wear a diadem, for that day the honor of a circlet was Aki’s alone.

“Shall we be off?” asked the bridegroom, whose skin had gone as white as milk. He swayed for a moment when he rose to his feet, and Haru put out a hand to steady him.

“Who was it that declared his love before a crowd of thousands, brother?” he said, watching the color steal back into Aki’s cheeks. “Come, _jundiina_ —it is time that we see this one wed at last!”

Milad and Nagisa cheered at the tops of their lungs, and with the three younger boys as escort Aki threw open the door and began the long walk down to the festival chamber where he was to be married.

*    *    *

Makoto had risen early that morning, for besides himself he had Momo and the children to ready for the day. The five Qasrians had been given a chamber with an enormous washroom, fitted with three long tubs and a princely shelf of oils and perfume; Makoto contrived to scrub Hayato and Ren from head to foot with Momo’s aid, but still he nearly laughed in relief when his mother appeared on the threshold in her dressing-gown to see to her daughter’s hair.

“Thank you, mother,” he said, drawing the curtains down the middle of the chamber before he and Momo leapt into their tubs. “I feared I would hurt her, for it is Gou who washes Ran’s hair, not I.”

Ran was a mild-mannered little maiden when Hayato was not there to encourage her mischief, and so her bath proceeded without a word of protest as she splashed about in the suds. Half an hour later she was wrapped in a linen robe as Natsuko brushed her long tresses by the fire, pressing the water out with a cloth before smoothing the knots with her fingers.  

“Am I hurting you, _radhiya_?”

“No,” she hummed, leaning back in her mother’s lap. “Will you braid me a crown to-day, _umma?_ ”

“Perhaps in another year, my daughter,” smiled the queen. “You and Ren are not yet thirteen, and I would have you dress like a little girl until you are so tall at least.” She chuckled and put up her hand by her head, swooping down to kiss the small princess as Makoto began to laugh. “You and Haru have already made me a grandmother, sweetheart, and I would have the twins as babies for ever if I might.”

“Are you glad for it, mother?” asked the prince, searching Natsuko’s eyes with a hint of worry in his own.

“Aye, I am,” she promised, patting his cheek. “I told you, did I not—from the day I saw him first I knew he was meant for you, and I never thought for a moment that he would marry Ran at all. It will be an honor to call Haru my son, for he loves our homeland as his own and you with all his heart.”

After Ran’s hair was dried both mother and daughter took their leave, for they were to ready themselves with Sakura, Miya, and Gou in the queen’s dressing chamber. Makoto and Momo were left with the little lads, who cut all sorts of capers as the dancer coaxed them into their robes.

“ _Ren!_ ” cried Makoto, forcing a cotton chemise over the small prince’s head. “We shall be late, and what will Haru say then?”

“Nothing at all,” said his brother, jumping up to hang from Momo’s shoulders. “He will forgive us the moment he sees you, if you give him a kiss in greeting.”

“Haru will not say a word, but Gou will scold herself hoarse,” said Momo, lifting a crimson eyebrow as Ren came crashing back to the floor. The children were the treasures of Sardahan, and the trouble was that they knew it; all the young men from Seijurou down to Nagisa worshipped the ground they trod on, and only the ladies were wise enough to take them in hand when they needed it.

Ren said nothing more as Makoto fastened his jewels, leaving Hayato to Momo’s care until both of the boys were fully dressed and adorned. At last all four were ready for the gathering, and even the elder pair could not keep themselves from laughing for joy as the others came out to join them. All of the Qasrians were clad in their country’s colors, green and white and purple afire with gold and silver embroidery. Makoto’s robes were the finest of the lot, befitting his rank as first heir, and though neither of the twins wore a band at their brows he was crowned with a golden diadem.

“Shall we go?” asked Sakura, whose right hand was clasped in Rin’s.

“Aye, onward!” cheered Hayato, scrambling up onto Kisumi’s back as Ran and Ren pranced on ahead.

By and by they joined the laughing crowd on the floor below, and found themselves swept up in the mob as it poured down the stairs to the feasting-hall. Gou scarcely stifled a gasp as she entered, for the place was adorned from floor to ceiling with living flowers—flowers kept fresh long after parting with the stems that bore them, for the _sabars_ and indigo of the desert kept their color far better than even the finest blooms of the East. Aki and Jun were already sitting enthroned on the dais at the front of the room, with Haru and Rei at Aki’s right and Jun’s two cousins at her left. Haru glanced up the moment Makoto stepped into the chamber, favoring the prince with a tender look before turning back to his brothers.

Over the next quarter-hour the remainder of the guests came streaming in; Makoto caught sight of Lord Yamazaki and his wife the princess through the tumult, followed by what seemed to be the whole of the Iwatobian army dressed in their ceremonial mail. Last came the delegation from Ram-Susah, accompanied by the emperor’s council and all the maidens of the court. Hiromasa and Kaguya took their places by the altar with Lord and Lady Kirishima once the assembly grew quiet, instructing the promised pair to join hands above the fire so the ceremony might begin.

*    *    *

Haru had witnessed a handful of weddings in his time, the latest of which had been Rin’s to Sakura in Qasr that autumn. At each one he had gazed at the faces of both bridegrooms and brides, wondering if perhaps he too might find his beloved some day—and when such a blessing might come, if the Goddess saw fit to allow it. In his youth he had always imagined himself standing alone at the _raqas_ after Aki’s marriage, stopping only now and then to dance with Rei, perhaps, or Jun...until he laid eyes on the soul who was wrought to match him, and knew it for what it was. But the love that he learned in the kindly East was dearer than all of his childhood musings, and even as Jun and Aki spoke their vows he turned his gaze towards Makoto’s face and did not look away.

The Iwatobian rites for marriage were longer by far than the ones he had heard in Qasr, spoken solely in the Western tongue without a word in the common speech—but the sudden crack in Aki’s steady voice was plain as day to all the guests in the chamber, no matter from whence they hailed. So were the tears upon Jun’s dark lashes, which broke from her deep-brown eyes and coursed down to her chin the moment Hiromasa pronounced them husband and wife—tears born of both grief and joy, for she and Aki had been parted for many years with naught but a meeting each season. But now no power save Heaven could come between them, and the knowledge of it was nearly enough to bring both princess and prince to weeping.

Haru was jolted back to attention as the chamber broke into a thunderous roar of applause, and a moment later the wind was nearly crushed from his body as Jun and Aki snatched their two brothers up in their arms. Rei found voice with a cry for help, but choked as it was into the lining of Aki’s collar nobody but Haru heard it.

“I wish you did not have to leave us,” sobbed Jun, kissing them both on their sooty brows. “All the while I was gone I thought we should all be together again some day, and now—”

“Do not cry, my heart,” murmured Aki, drying her eyes with a handkerchief as the wedded pair loosened their embrace. “Such is the way of things, and if one must go to the east—is it not better so, that the other should follow behind him?”

The exchange had gone unseen by the crowd, for the moment the vows were finished a storm of colored streamers fell down like a curtain from the galleries above, hiding the four on the plinth from view until they had straightened their robes. This last was Rin’s doing, for after the match the day before he had engaged an army of children to creep through the balconies unseen and throw the ribbons over the balustrade.

After the vows were finished there was luncheon, and dancing—and the revelry spilled from the festival chamber and out into the grounds, with song and laughter flowing from the throats of princes and servants and soldiers alike as the twelfth bell came and went. It was dusk before they realized it, and the folk of the town came forth from their houses to join the royal party as the merriment poured out of the gilded gates to fill the streets below.

*    *    *

At long last perhaps all the citadel made its way down to the sands, and when Makoto and Haru stumbled out into the dunes hand-in-hand they were struck silent by the peerless beauty that filled the skies above them. Haru had spoken truly when he said that the stars seemed nearer to earth in the West, for their light was pale and fresh and close like water beneath the sun.

_Our skies are wide and cloudless and clear, and by night the heavens burn like fire._

“ _Rayie_ , Haru-chan,” breathed Makoto, spinning in a circle with his face tipped back to drink in the glow of the ether. “ _Beautiful_ —”

“I told you once long ago, did I not—that for every star we knew from the East a thousand shine in the West?” said Haru, smiling as the Qasrian’s arms crept round his waist. An instant later Makoto’s chin came to rest by his ear, and so they stood touching at hip and shoulder when the first of the six-shelled firecrackers exploded above their heads. Haru shut his eyes as Makoto tightened his grasp, for somehow he knew he could not bear for the day to end—but time cared not for the wishes of men, and so he turned away from the gaiety of the crowd to stare into Makoto’s face.

“What is it, sweetheart?” murmured the elder prince, brushing back a lock of hair from Haru’s forehead. Haru parted his lips to reply, but the soft-spoken words were stolen from his throat—or else he never voiced them at all, for close to a hundred crackers burst into the night at once, filling the plain with their whistling shrieks as the Iwatobian took his beloved in his arms and kissed him.

The heavens had turned from orange to pink by the time they broke apart, but the two princes below noticed nothing—nothing but the boundless joy in eyes as fair as the sea, whether bright with winter’s green or blue as the vaults of summer, and so they nearly jumped out of their skins when Rei loomed out of the darkness behind them. Milad lay fast asleep on the steward’s back, swathed in a woolen blanket to keep the chill at bay.

“There you are,” grumbled Rin, trudging out of the shadows with Sakura and Gou. Aki and Jun were laughing together at his heels, and though they were walking along with the rest they seemed to have shut the world away until naught was left within it save themselves alone.

“Rei has been hunting high and low for you both—what posessed you to go off so far?” scolded Gou, muttering a prayer for patience as she shook her head at the pair of them.

“Look, Haru-chan!” cried Kashi, looking down from his perch on Nagisa’s shoulders. He pointed away to a pavilion close by the gates, which lay beside a flaming pit perhaps thirteen feet across. “They are readying the ring for the last worship, and you and Rei will have to join the others before long.”

“Aye, you are right,” said Haru, unclasping the bands of Milad’s basket and handing the child to Makoto. He kissed the baby on his downy head before bidding his sweetheart farewell, clapping his cousin’s shoulder as Rei pulled him away towards the _khayma._

“Where are you going, _amarya?_ ” begged Makoto, catching Haru  by the hand. “And when—”

“I will return with a spectacle, my darling,” laughed the prince, running back to embrace his intended before vanishing into the night with his steward beside him.

*    *    *

They saw neither Haru nor Rei for a while after that, and at length small Milad awoke at the sound of the crackers and burst into tears of fright. It took Makoto’s best efforts to soothe him, and once the child was asleep again his father had wholly forgotten Haru’s promise.

The men by the fiery pit had tended the embers for an hour or more, never allowing them to burst into flame; when the orange haze above the coals grew dangerously bright, the pit was covered in fuel again so the ash might smoulder unhindered. Makoto wondered if perhaps the fire would be for cooking, but all the party had dined at the feast after sundown, and he doubted that even Momo’s appetite could bear another mouthful. He furrowed his brow as a pair of manservants came sprinting up with a pail of water between them, which they set by the sparkling ring before rushing back to the pavilion.

“What in Heaven’s name are they doing?” murmured Rin.

Suddenly the canvas walls of the tent were drawn back to the poles, and Makoto saw that the _khayma_ was filled with a sea of boys, each close to Rei in height; it seemed that all the swains of marriageable age in the place had sequestered themselves away behind the curtains, and at last he knew where Haru and Rei had gone when they departed the company after supper.  The glow in their eyes was bright and soft at once, as if the very gods themselves had gifted the lads with their grace.

One by one they fell into step together, melding into a single file like a row of gemstones as they came forth from their abode. They were strangely alike, and yet they were not so, but for the life of him Makoto could not say why it was thus.

“What are they at, my Lady?” asked Momo, struggling in his brother’s arms as he peered over Sakura’s shoulder.

Makoto frowned, for the youths streaming out of the pavilion were shining like fish in the moonlight; the rays had been reflected rather than illuminating their garments, as if the lads were dressed in mirrored steel. He squinted through the shadows and caught the gleam of scarlet silk in the firelight, deep in its hue like the crimson ground of the Iwatobian flag, and paired with the sunlit sheen of golden bands and bracelets on their arms. In the darkness he could scarcely tell one from the next, for save Haru and Rei the lads were crowned with hair that fell unbound to their waists. The Qasrians gaped at the spectacle as they passed, blinking against the gloom as Haru strode on at their head—for they wore nothing but a pair of trousers apiece, and jewels enough at their arms and throats to set the palace ablaze.

“It is the _raqas’nar_ ,” murmured Jun. “The night a union is vowed, the boys who have yet to marry gather together on the sands and dance to prove their might to the maidens they wish to court.”

“What is Haru doing among them, then?” laughed Makoto. The tender light stole into his eyes again, reflecting the fiery gems that sparkled on Haru’s fourth finger as he laid his palms on his breast. “He is promised in marriage, and so is Rei.”

“Look there, Lord Amyr,” muttered Aki. “See the rope of pearls clasped round his throat, and Rei’s?”

“Aye, I do.”

“That stands for his betrothal,” came the reply. “All the lads who are to be wed wear the same, Makoto—the others dance for the girls of the court, but tonight he dances for you.”

With that he fell silent, wrapping an arm about his wife as the minstrels sitting on the dais set their hands to the strings. Haru lifted his face to the heavens and and rose up onto his toes, chanting a lyric in the Iwatobian speech before dancing into the embers.

For a moment there was nothing—nothing but the pallid glow about the soles of his feet, and _then_ —

*    *    *

In his youth Haru had often lain by the indigo shrubs in the courtyard with Aki and Rei, long enough to see them blossom under the rising sun. They scarcely stirred, at first, waking so slowly that when they moved he thought himself mistaken—and then the great lamp to the east rolled over the horizon like a billow breaking upon the shore, bringing the buds to life as they opened their throats to the dawn. The petals unfurled like a banner by the light of the waxing rays, and though they were cool and soft to his touch they burned like a garden of stars.

The embers were warm beneath his feet, feet that were numbed to the touch of fire in his childhood—covered from toe to heel in callouses that served him as well as a slipper, and so as he lifted his arms to the night he felt scarcely a thing. He eyed the glinting bed of ash as he broke into the dance, taking care not to break the crusted surface until a flurry of high-pitched notes floated up from the musicians’ dais—

Haru lifted his heel and brought it down on the iron-grey coals, steeling his ankle for the flash of pain as it sank into the embers. But even the heat of the fire was no grief to him, and a moment later the breath was plucked from his lungs as the earth burst into flower about him. The flames rippled up from beneath the coals like the petals of a golden blossom, surrounding him with an aureole of yellow light as his spine bent into a curving bow so his eyes might face the moon. He heard Kashi and the Qasrians crying out in wonder as if from far away, and extending his heel he smoothed a heap of dying embers over the wounds he had made in the soil, ensuring that the blaze would not cool until his comrades had taken their turn. The blinding flash on the rubies he wore went out with the smothered pyre, stripping the spell of the night from his limbs so that he was only himself again.

A single turn—a single motion, light and lithe as the gait of a doe—and he was standing alone on the sands again, lifting himself onto pointed toes as he leapt into the air and circled away to the opposite side where the rest of the lads were gathered. They rose at the prince’s signal and lifted their arms to the skies, swaying like a group of slender willows in the breeze so that when Rei came forth from their ranks he danced in the midst of a ring of scarlet and gold. By and by the others left the band and cantered into the embers, setting the hollow afire for as long as they could bear to stand there—and one by one the boys were crowned with a rippling light that seemed to have fallen from Heaven itself, transforming them for a moment into something more than human.

At last they quickened their pace and withdrew from the pit, darting round its perimeter so swiftly that the silent watchers could no longer tell one from the next—but it seemed that they sought the pails of water as they went, for a handful of the lads had seized the dippers floating on the surface and cast the bounty within to the ground. They danced for seven rounds—seven rounds and no more, and when they grew still their feet were coated with a layer of wet sand so that not even the deepest flames of the ring would have the power to hurt them.

The boys joined hands and fell to their knees as one, singing so that their voices were a perfect match for the music floating freely up to the clouds. The Qasrians scarcely dared to breathe as the prayer drew to an end, but a moment later a chorus of gasps tore from their lips like a storm—for the lads shouted into the darkness and sprang forward into the embers together, so that the flames shot up about them like jets of steam. The spectacle lasted no longer than an instant, for the fire died away into ash long before Momo and Rin stopped blinking their eyes at the heat.

With that the dancers saluted their audience and withdrew, leaving the manservants to put out the last of the embers. The crowd broke out in a storm of cheers, applauding until their palms ached as the boys slumped onto the ground and burst into laughter. Rei was lying flat on his back across Haru’s legs, while Haru himself had his hands pressed flat to the dust as he fought to catch his wind.

“You were beautiful, Rei-chan!” shrieked Nagisa, sprinting out of the shadows to throw himself on the steward’s chest. “I never knew you could dance so prettily—and here I call myself the head of a dancing-guild!”

“Do not you dare to try it, _rouhiya_ ,” said Rei, tugging fondly at a lock of Nagisa’s hair—for he had seen his beloved’s glance at the smoking pit and knew at once what it meant. “The soles of your feet are far too tender for fire, and you would be dreadfully hurt.”

“What of yours, Haru-chan?” asked Makoto, dropping to his knees in the sand beside his intended. Haru cast him a long-suffering glance and chuckled, for the weight of Rei and Nagisa on his legs had pressed him into the ground so that he could not move at all. Haru’s long feet were covered in soot and ash and fine-powdered dust, blanketing the skin beneath from ankle to toes; the hardened soles had guarded his flesh so well that not even the slightest patch of red had risen on his heels, and when Makoto took his sash and wiped the grit away he found that the prince’s skin was still as white as snow.

“Cool as water, sweetheart,” smiled Haru, holding out an arm as Milad tripped over the sand towards him. “What did you think of the dance?”

Makoto gave no reply, or at least none that the others could hear—but a minute later they turned their backs and looked steadily up at the stars, for they were themselves in the first flush of youth and love was known to them all.

Aki did not return to his brothers’ chamber that night, nor did he ever lie in the bed beside Haru’s again. The charm of his youth was lost to him for ever, but he did not regret it a moment—for the child had grown, as children must, and so the rest of his years were spent with Jun as they had always been meant to be.

But still his place did not go empty, for Haru was woken not long after midnight by a knock from the passage beyond. He tucked small Milad beneath the covers and went to the door on stocking-feet, swinging it back on its creaking hinges to find his beloved standing alone on the threshold.

“Haru-chan, _amarya—_ ”

“Come in _, shin’ainaru-ko._ ”

And so the door fell shut in Makoto’s wake, and for the first since the day they were parted in Qasr he slept in his treasure’s arms.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all your support, everyone. I would never have written so much and so seriously without your feedback <3 so please keep leaving comments as often as you like, they honestly make my day.   
> See you again at chapter 18 in mid-June!!! :)


	18. Odds and Ends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which a steward marries a dancer, and Rin is up to no good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I'm posting early, but Chapter 19 is already underway so I thought it'd be worth it! Enjoy, everyone!!

On the second morning after Aki’s wedding Haru arose from his bed with a knot in his back, for somehow he had contorted his body into a curve with his feet lying between Makoto’s and his face tilted close to the eastern wall. He bent and kissed Makoto’s palm before lifting it from his waist, clambering over the Qasrian’s legs and down onto the tile behind him. Milad was still asleep in his crib, with his limbs splayed out like a starfish’s to banish the worst of the heat. Haru laughed at the sight of him and brushed the baby’s cheek with a tender finger, wondering as he often did why his son had chosen to depart the confectioner’s shop beside him on that summer’s day in the marketplace so long ago. 

After summoning a manservant to bring him his breakfast he chanced to look at the carven door to Rei’s bedchamber, and found to his surprise that it was hanging ajar. He went to the threshold and peered inside; the room within was dark and silent, and both Rei’s narrow mattress and Nagisa’s folding-bed were neatly made up for the day. The lads themselves were absent, and Haru frowned and turned back to the timepiece on his dressing table. He blinked in astonishment at the hanging frame, for he had not mistaken the hour at all; it was a single bell past the  _ iida’atan,  _ and the sun was only half-risen. Haru had only woken so early to accompany the dawn patrol, which was set to begin again that day now that the wedding was finished with. For a moment he sat wondering where Rei and Nagisa had gone, but after finishing his meal and leaving a pair of covered dishes for Makoto he donned a jousting-tunic and set off for the armory three floors below. 

On the second level he rounded a corner without minding his step and cannoned into a man perhaps an inch or so taller than he was, and both were knocked back to the tiles by the blow. Haru sprang up first and offered the other a hand up, gasping despite himself when he saw that it was Rin. 

“What are you doing about so early?” he asked, noting the bundle of robes hanging over the advisor’s arm. “And those tunics—”

“I am off to the dancing-halls,” announced the elder lad, righting his cap with a flourish. “Sakura and the others went ahead, but she left her cropped tunics behind in our quarters, and so she sent me to fetch them.”

“Is that where Rei went, then?” sighed Haru, wondering what business his brother and the rest of the Qasrians might have with the performer’s guild. “And Nagisa?”

“I expect so,” shrugged Rin, pushing past the prince and making straight for the stairway. Haru shook his head and set his course for the soldiers’  _ tirsana _ , where he joined Aki and half of his own regiment between the rows of shields and weapons to ready himself for the patrol. Once they were clad in their helms and breastplates they made off for the camels’ keep, parting their own beasts from the rest before making their way past the palace gates and down to the streets below. 

With that they began their daily ride about the borders of the city, looking this way and that for trouble—an advancing army in name, although for the last ten years and more the patrol had only served to ready the city for sandstorms before they could strike. Aki rode at the head of the battalion with Haru trotting along beside him, and plodding through the sands behind them were the two Kirishima brothers. They seemed to be laughing together and whispering to Nao and Asahi when the four camels were close enough, and Haru sat back and marveled at the sight. Ikuya and Natsuya had been at odds since the latter’s return from Sikandar, and the prince had not seen Ikuya smile in his brother’s presence for the last three years and more. 

A moment later his jaw dropped open in surprise, for it seemed that the boys were laughing at  _ him _ —but before he could stop to wonder what it meant, his cousin pulled at his camel’s reins and drew away to the side. 

“Fall back, Haru,” Aki commanded, slowing his pace so that the others could go before them. Haru pressed his knee into Muna’s side and obeyed at once, for while Aki usually rode at the head of the regiment he elected to ride at its tail now and again. 

“Ought I to go in your stead?” said the younger prince. By rights he belonged before the rest if Aki chose to follow them, and he could not fathom why his cousin had drawn him back alongside him. 

“Nay, you are to remain with me.” 

Aki said nothing more as the rest of the patrol passed by, studiously keeping their eyes on their camels’ necks so that neither of their lords could look them in the face. Once the last of the boys had gone before the princes, Aki turned back to the path down which they had come before motioning Haru to follow him. He glanced at the others before falling into step behind the elder boy, frowning like his uncle did on petition-day when he saw that Ikuya and the others were walking at the rear of the regiment where before they had been at the front. 

“Where are we going?” asked Haru, perplexed. He and Aki had parted from the others nearly thirty strides back, and if not for Asahi’s smirking face he would have thought that his cousin had simply forgotten to prod his camel in the right direction. They were rapidly approaching the southern half of the city walls, while the rest of the patrol was trudging on towards the north. 

“You are to be married in the spring, are you not?” teased Aki, tugging at the strap of his quiver so that it lay flat between his ribs. “What sort of brother would I be if I let you go to back to Qasr without a wedding present?”

“A wedding present hidden in the southern face of the citadel?” sighed the younger prince, recalling the stuffed snake that Aki had thrown under his bed to frighten him when they were children. “I am almost afraid there will be a pail of water hung at the top to drench me—do you remember the trap you set for Sasabe over the schoolroom door ten summers ago?”

Aki burst into laughter, turning round to gaze at his brother with a mischievous glint in his eye. “You will like this better, I think.”

They skirted the sandstone perimeter for perhaps five minutes longer, and by the time they drew to a halt the last of the regiment had vanished into the distance. Haru opened his mouth to speak, but Aki merely straightened his gloves and held out a hand to silence him. 

“Shut your eyes,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ .”

“If it is another snake, I swear to the Goddess I will not forgive you,” threatened Haru, dropping his eyelids as bidden and turning away to the east. His brother chuckled under his breath, and as Haru sat there with his eyes shut tight he heard the elder boy slip out of the saddle and urge his Shamlal down to her knees. 

“Hold still,” warned the crown prince, though Haru had not dared stir a muscle from his perch on Muna’s back—but an instant later he gasped and nearly tumbled off his seat, for his camel was sinking down into the sand without a word from her master. A rough hand caught at his shoulder to steady him, tugging him free of the stirrups so that he stood on the ground at his cousin’s right. 

“Aki—”

“Hush, Haru.”

Haru held his tongue with some difficulty, for his visions of a mottled serpent curled beneath his mattress were growing clearer by the second. Aki laughed again and took in a tremendous breath before letting it loose in a high-pitched cry: not unlike the haunting calls with which headsmen directed their beasts in the desert, and yet the rise and fall of the prince’s voice had been more akin to a whistle. Haru had known the ringing whoop long ago, but in his youth it had broken from his own lips and not from his cousin’s at all. A great gust of wind rushed upon his face and swept back the hair from his brow, but before it died away he found that his eyes were full of tears. He opened them the moment Aki’s soft touch warmed his sleeve, and at the magnificence of the sight that greeted him he croaked a sob and fell back against Muna’s side. 

His cousin stood with his arm outstretched to the heavens, and standing with its back to the sun on Aki’s hand was an eagle rustling its wings in the gale. The talons curled on the prince’s gauntlet flashed like a ternion of blades in the light, and the close-lying feathers at the eagle’s neck glittered like a ring of burnished bronze. 

“A golden eagle,” Haru choked, lifting his own wrist to take the kingly bird on his arm. It left Aki’s glove without protest, fluttering across the two yards between them until it settled near Haru’s elbow. Haru lifted his face and gazed up into the eagle’s eyes, which shone like pools of amber with pitch at their hearts. 

The stare that met him was sharp and fierce and proud, as befitted a creature who roamed the skies as it pleased—for neither force nor trickery could sway such a splendid beast to the will of men, and he thrilled to the sting of its claws through his glove as he thrilled to the heat of the desert. The weight of the touch filled his heart with joy, and for a moment he was a lad of fifteen again, practicing his falconry between the dunes with Rei’s pale-breasted merlin and Aki’s grey goshawk circling above him—

_ “He knows no trammels, my Hiro. See how he flies, Rei! He might go to the ends of the earth if he wished it, and as long as there is a goodly wind at his breast there are no laws for him—he is as free a creature as ever was. How I wish that I were so—and lord of the air as he is, still he returns to me!” _

“You remembered, then,” he whispered, running a finger across the curve of one dark-brown wing. The eagle started and ruffled its tail, cocking its head in first Aki’s direction and then Haru’s as if puzzled at the resemblance between them. “Oh, Aki!”

“She is called Alsiya,” smiled the elder prince. “What do you think, my brother?”

“It seems almost as if I know her,” murmured Haru, holding his breath as she bent down from her perch on his arm to look him full in the face. “How beautiful you are, my  _ mallika!  _ The golden ring round your neck, the black feathers at your tail—even the hue of your eyes—”

“Aye, and rightly so,” said Aki. “She was fledged in our keep six years ago, with Sayf as her dam and Hiro her sire.”

At this last Haru found that he could say nothing more, and so he allowed his lips to shape the warbling cry they had shaped so often in the past—rising and falling like the voice of a flute as he called, until Alsiya lifted her head to the skies and gripped his glove with her talons before rising into the air. Her wings were broader than Haru had thought them to be, and only then did he recall that it was always so with the huntresses; they were larger and stronger than their mates by far, and when the great stretch of golden feathers unfurled above his head the sun went dark behind it—for Alsiya’s wings were nearly eight feet across, surpassing her father’s as Sayf’s had surely done before her. 

Haru sprang back and shouted with exhilaration, watching as she parted the wind in her wake like a scimitar parting skin. Not even his Hiro had cloven the skies so swiftly, and he found himself running over the dunes in Alsiya’s wake as she flew towards the open desert. 

“ _ Shukraan,  _ Aki!” he called, shrieking with glee as the buttresses fell away to the west. His cousin laughed at the top of his lungs and gave chase, and suddenly their boyhood was close at hand as it had not been for years—but at last Haru knew that its cheer would never abandon their hearts, and the wound he had borne so long for Hiro was healed at the knowledge that his lordly friend had not left him wholly. 

It seemed that Alsiya was pleased by their wonder, for after hearing their praises she remained aloft for so long and at such a great height that they nearly lost sight of her. At long last Haru called her back from her path among the clouds, and she tucked back her wings to her tail at the cry and plunged like a stone from the heavens. Haru nearly cried out in alarm, but before he could speak the sun was veiled behind her as the twin banners of gold flared out against the light to slow her fall. 

So it was that she led them away to the keep set within the city walls, flying ahead of the princes until they came to the doors. One of the elder falconers answered their knock and took her within to feed her, and after the eagle had finished her meal the brothers turned away and jogged back to the spot where Muna and Shamlal awaited them. Muna had fallen asleep in the sand, and she was most reluctant to rise and bear her master back to the palace when he prodded her awake. But at last she yielded to Haru’s coaxing and marched off to the gates with Shamlal following close behind, walking slowly to the marble  _ alcazar  _ where a groom came running out of the stables to retrieve her. Makoto appeared on the threshold a minute later with Asahi and Ikuya, who snickered into their sleeves as the Qasrian dropped his helmet and crossed the courtyard to embrace his intended. 

“I have done with afternoon practice and evening patrol,” he laughed, bending thrice to kiss Haru’s forehead as Aki passed Shamlal’s reins to a serving boy. “Or at least I would have done, if it would not leave Milad alone—what were you at all morning, my love? The others returned nearly half an hour ago.”

“Receiving a wedding-gift fit for a king,” cried Jun. She and Aki exchanged a pair of tender glances, and Haru realized at once that he owed his morning’s joy to his sister as well as his brother. Jun had departed the citadel for her clan’s estate in the north nearly two years before Hiro’s passing, but still she had known of Haru’s sorrow at the loss of his friend; they had written to one another perhaps twice or three times a week, and though Haru himself said nothing about it Aki had certainly told her all. The princess had been delighted by Haru’s own gift to her before her wedding, and after his return from Qasr that winter she thanked him until she was hoarse—for Haru sent word from the east when he heard of her arrival in Sahrastan, surrendering his snow-white mare Mahzarin into the maiden’s keeping. 

“Aye, and her name is Alsiya,” smiled Haru, taking Makoto’s hands in his and drawing them up to his lips. “A golden  _ nasir _ finer than all the best of her kind, for her sire was a prince among eagles.”

“ _ Rayie _ , Haru-chan,” Makoto replied, leading him away to the palace doors. “Perhaps we might bring Milad out to see her tomorrow, for he must grow calm with the birds long before he is old enough to begin learning falconry.”

“Aye, we shall,” promised the younger prince. “But now I must have my luncheon, my heart, for I have had nothing since dawn. Where is Milad?”

“Nagisa and Sakura took him down to the dancing-halls with Rei an hour after breakfast,” frowned his beloved. “Those two have been plotting from the day they arrived here, and they will tell nobody what they are doing. Rin and Momo went to join them at the tenth bell, and I have not seen them since.”

“They are making some mischief or other, no doubt,” Haru chuckled. “Let us go to fetch him, my love, and then we shall all dine together.”

The two princes trooped off into the palace and made their way through the first-level corridors until they came to the dancing hall, which lay behind a white wooden door carved through with the Iwatobian seal. Candlelight shone through the painted holes from the lamps in the chamber beyond, and with it came the lilting voices of harps and flutes and strings. Haru made to set his palm on the doorknob, but the second he touched the polished bronze he found himself barred from entering by a young man dressed in blue. 

“Lord Aichirou!” he cried, too startled to rebuke him. He had known the silver-haired lad since he was a child himself, and though they saw one another but rarely the two were friends of a sort. Haru was better acquainted with Lord Aichirou’s wife, for Lady Hanamura (or Nitori, since her marriage) was a distant cousin of his; the princes’ grandfather had come from the Hanamura clan, and his wedding to the Queen had raised the family’s rank in court. For a moment Haru stared down at the elder boy in question, but then he recalled that both Ai and Hana had been in the dancers’ guild for the past eight years, and so it was no wonder that the three entertainers from Qasr had sought their company. 

“ _ Ohaiyou,  _ Prince Haru,” said Aichirou, bobbing a hasty salute. He reached into the shadows behind him and took Milad from Nagisa’s shoulders, plumping him into Haru’s arms before bowing a second time and glancing up at his liege. “ _ Asif,  _ my lord, but I cannot grant you entrance within.”

“You cannot grant me entrance?” repeated Haru, bewildered. “By whose order?” He turned round to stare at his cousin, but Aki threw up his hands and shook his head as if to signal that he knew nothing more of the matter than Haru did. 

“By mine,” said Rei, popping out of the gloom at Nagisa’s elbow. “We shall see you for supper,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ , but until then the five of us will remain here in the dancing-hall.”

“What in the Goddess’s name are  _ you  _ doing with the guild?” demanded Aki, lifting his brows at the red-faced steward. “You are no dancer, Rei—and why have you shut the drapes? There is plenty of sun out of doors, and here you are burning the torches for light.”

“They are shut so that nobody might see what we are about, Aki-chan,” sang Nagisa, poking the prince’s cheek. “You will find out in time, but until then you must let us alone.”

“What is Rin doing down here, then?” asked Haru, thrusting a foot between the doors before Aichirou could lock them. “He is no dancer, certainly, and even if Rei was not trained with the guild he can keep pace with them at least.”

“I am here because I wish to be,” sniffed the advisor, peering over Rei’s shoulder with Sakura on his arm. “Now get you gone, the both of you, for we have only a fortnight remaining and you shall only delay us.”

With that the whitewashed doors fell shut, and once the latch had fallen into place a muslin curtain swept across it from within so that the princes could no longer peer through the carving-holes. Makoto said nothing as Haru took his hand again and tugged him down the passage to the soldier’ dining chamber, but when they stopped at the threshold he turned back and burst into laughter; Ikuya and Asahi were still trailing along in their wake, following on tiptoe so that the elder boys would not hear them. 

“What is it, Makoto?” said Jun, brushing her hair out of the twisted braids she wore in the ring while sparring. She glanced back in the Qasrian’s direction and smiled at the two young guards, who were looking steadily up at the ceiling as if they had not noticed her merriment at all. 

“Sahrastan has come to life again at last, Highness,” said Asahi, grinning from ear to ear. “We have had nothing to amuse us for these last six years and more save Natsuya’s wedding, and after you journeyed back from the east its gaiety followed behind you.”

“And we did not even have my brother’s wedding, since he saw fit to marry in the north without sending word to Father,” grumbled Ikuya. 

“Are you still bitter for that,  _ sadiq _ ?” asked his friend, lifting a crimson eyebrow. “It has been nearly three months, and—”

“I shall be as bitter as I like for as long as I please!” snapped the dark-haired boy “And if—”

But the others never heard what the poor lad had wished to say, for Asahi freed his hands from his gauntlets and poked at the crest of Ikuya’s hip with such force that the young soldier screeched like an angry cat before batting the finger away and throwing himself headlong into the dining chamber. Asahi snorted and hung his gloves round his neck, pursuing his companion between the tables until Ikuya’s protests were drowned by the the regiment’s laughter. 

“Come to life indeed,” muttered Aki, making straight for the bubbling stew-pot over the fire. “ _ He  _ has not had to manage a riotous cavalry for days upon end, nay, and neither has he spent hour upon hour out in the sands keeping his patrol from shooting every  _ sahalia  _ in the path—”

Jun shook her head and followed her husband to the southern end of the hall, leaving Haru and Makoto by the door with Milad as they stared after the long-suffering prince. 

“Perhaps we ought to go down to the kitchens instead,” whispered Makoto, plucking at Haru’s elbow. “Jalaluddin would lay a table for us, I know, and there we might eat in peace.”

“Aye, we will go at once,” said Haru, whose eyes were as round as coins. “Or else I shall have to watch my cousin murder half the Western army, and it is far too early in the day for that.”

With that they turned and fled to the northern wing, where they found Gou and Seijurou breaking their fast in the kitchens with the little ones. The general and his wife were welcome company after the clamor of the morning, and the two princes had dearly missed the children all that day. They chattered over one another at the tops of their voices as the meal went on, telling Haru and Makoto of all they had seen and done since dawn. 

“What of you, Gou?” asked Haru, who had scarcely laid eyes upon the young scholar since the day of Aki’s wedding. “What have you been about all this week?”

“Combing the halls of lore,” she laughed, poking at a morsel of pheasant. “But all the manuscripts are written in the Western tongue, and save one or two in the common script I found nothing to read at all.”

“There is a second hall for the common speech, I think,” said Makoto. “Perhaps we might go after luncheon.”

After they had finished their meal the party split in three; Gou and the twins went up to Haru’s old schoolroom with Hayato to commence their morning lessons, while Seijurou claimed small Milad for the afternoon despite his father’s protests. 

“I have scarcely seen him since I left my quarters at dawn,” argued the Iwatobian, clutching his son to his chest. “What need have you—”

Makoto smiled and stooped to whisper in the prince’s ear, speaking under his breath so that Sei could not hear a word—but it seemed that his friend had softened Haru’s temper, for he sighed and surrendered the child to Seijurou’s arms without a breath of complaint the moment Makoto withdrew from his side. 

“I will take him back to watch the dancers,” laughed the general, permitting the baby to tweak his nose as he went out to the corridor. “ _ Shukraan,  _ Haru—I will bring him back to your quarters in an hour, then.” With that he took Milad on his shoulders and vanished into the passageway after giving his thanks to the cook, leaving his liege and friend in the kitchens behind him. 

“What shall we do until then, sweetheart?” asked Makoto, stooping to kiss the crown of Haru’s head. “If—”

“ _ I  _ am going back to my bed,” said the younger prince, laying his cheek against Makoto’s. “We left before the seventh bell for our rounds this morning, and I am still weary—but I would have you come with me, for I have had scarcely a minute to pass with you alone since the wedding.”

“With all my heart, my love,” murmured the Qasrian, taking Haru’s hand in his as the two lads clambered off the bench. The elder of the pair had not slept in his own chambers after Aki’s marriage, and although the children had protested his leaving they grew used to it in time—for in his absence there was nobody to send them to bed at sundown, and so they cut all sorts of capers in their quarters with Momo long after all four of them ought to have been abed. 

But though Makoto had spent countless nights in Qasr with Haru lying by his side he never ceased to treasure the sight of him sleeping there, and after their sorrowful parting the month before he held his beloved’s presence thrice as dear. Nobody saw hide nor hair of the two for the rest of the day save Gou, who crept into their apartment with Milad at the second bell. She nearly laughed aloud to see the princes slumbering together in Haru’s narrow bed, for the mattress was wholly unsuited for a man of Makoto’s height. But still she knew it was no grief to him as long as he could rest with Haru in his arms, and so she tucked small Milad between them before dousing the lamp and returning to the others in the dancing-chamber below. 

* * *

The next morning Haru and Makoto rose together, for the Qasrian had been given leave to join Haruka’s regiment for the morning patrol round the city. Neither was willing to leave small Milad behind, and so they bathed and dressed him before breaking their fast in the soldiers’ mess and running out to the  _ wahasha _ to ready their camels. Aki had gone before them, and so when they passed the gate to the pens they saw him leading Shamlal out to the terrace. Milad blew him a cheerful kiss as their paths crossed at the door, and when the good uncle caught at his palm to return it he wriggled from head to toe like a happy  _ afhiya.  _

“A babe on patrol?” laughed Aki, ruffling his cousin’s hair. “Whatever next,  _ shin’ainaru-ko?  _ I have had naught but surprises from you ever since you set off for the east in Huzayran, but this at least is a pleasant one.”

“At least?” echoed Haru. He tightened the bands that held Milad to his chest and took Muna’s reins from Makoto, coaxing the drowsy camel down to her knees before vaulting onto her back. “They were all pleasant save one, and you know it as well as I.”

“Perhaps, but still you nearly stopped my heart with each letter,” said his cousin. “I spilt my tea all down the table when I heard that you had taken a child as your ward, and though you laughed to hear it I am sure that Jalal did not.”

“ _ Shahn’amyr! _ ”

The three princes turned their heads at the cry, frowning almost as one at the queer sight that met them in the street below. Asahi and Ikuya were standing in the dust with Nao and Natsuya, and all four of the guards were struggling with their camels. The beasts refused to kneel so that their masters could climb into the saddle, and as Nao set his heels and pulled at his camel’s bridle it tossed its tawny head and knocked him aside into a bed of indigo blossoms. 

“What is the matter with them, Natsuya?” grumbled Aki, dropping Shamlal’s reins and striding over to the others. “And this one—have you cleaned beneath her saddle, Master Kirishima?”

“Aye, my Lord,” panted Nao, accepting the prince’s hand. “Every morning, as you instructed us. But every beast in the  _ wahasha  _ has been acting so after leaving the pens, and not even the grooms can tell what ails them.”

“They are not ill, certainly,” frowned Makoto, stepping closer to Asahi’s mount and staring up into its long-lashed eyes. “And I know little about Western camels, but it does not seem that there is anything ailing yours at all.”

Haru licked the tip of his finger and held it over his head, weighing the pace of the dusty breeze against the chill it left on his skin. His lips quirked up in a smile at the touch of it, and for a moment Makoto stood dazed as if he could scarcely believe that he held the love of a soul so fair as the one that shone before him. 

“It is cooler today,” mused Haru, gazing tenderly at his beloved as the elder prince climbed onto his own steed. “Perhaps it displeases them after the heat we have had this year.”

At long last the rest of the company managed to mount their charges, and with that the group moved off from the pens and down to the gates where the rest of the regiment sat waiting. When they glimpsed their liege passing under the portcullis they lined themselves in formation, until there were twenty-five rows of guardsmen with two men riding abreast. Aki rode at the head of the battalion with Ikuya beside him, and behind them came Haru and Makoto with Milad sitting before his father. Once the very last of the soldiers had fallen into place they set off round the citadel, glancing left and right as they went for something that might bode ill. 

The gates lay on the eastern face of the city, close by the falconers’ keep; and so the regiment rode due north for a while in silence as they surveyed the first of the quarters. Aki did not permit his men to speak during the morning and evening patrols, for fear they would lose themselves in talk and overlook an advancing threat—but that day there was laughter to be heard from the younger lads now and then, and though the crown prince had turned his head at the sound he spoke no word to quiet them. Iwatobi had known nothing at all of war for the last ten years and more, but every one of the boys in their company had lived through the grief of Dhaika’s attack on Sahrastan so long ago. 

For the princes the worst of their torment began and ended that very night, but the others knew no such kindness. The two lads and their steward had borne their share of suffering with the death of the Queen Suhaila, but still they had not remained to watch the fire consume the town and half a city made homeless—and nor had they seen their fathers fighting in the courtyard alongside all the men who could yet lift a sword. Certainly they never saw Kazumi and Kaguya don the dead Empress’s armor and take to the streets with the new king and his brother, but the swains who rode behind them had witnessed it all. It was thus that they came determined to Aki’s training ground when they were old enough to join the army themselves, and so he had never so much as lifted his voice to scold them while they were in his command. 

At last they rounded the northern watchtower, and Aki held up his palm to stop them as he stared at the western horizon. It was darker than it had been earlier in the day, and as he stood squinting at the heavens Makoto cried out and put a hand to his cheek. 

“Makoto?” asked Haru, turning in the saddle to face him. He wondered if perhaps a biting insect had stung the Qasrian’s face, but the moment he met his beloved’s eyes he saw it was not so—for Makoto was laughing as if he had lost his wits, and an instant later the others joined him in his mirth as the skies were cloven in two. They had nothing more than the piercing  _ crack  _ overhead to warn them, and the next moment the lot of them were drenched from head to foot—for the drought had ended at last, driven away to its grave as the roiling ether surrendered its bounty like fireworks loosing a shower of stars.

“ _ Almatar _ ,” whispered Haru, shaking from shoulders to ankles as he turned up his face. Nearly half of the soldiers had broken into tears, weeping like children as the rain plunged down and lifted the cares of the last eight moons from their shoulders. Haru tucked Milad tightly to his chest and slipped down from his perch on Muna’s back, spinning like a top in the deluge the moment he found his feet. Makoto followed suit at once, as did the better part of the guardsmen—and he saw that Haru was sobbing, sheltering Milad from the downpour as best he could while kneeling in the darkening sand. 

“It is over,” choked Aki, who had fallen into the dust at his cousin’s side. Haru’s head fell forward onto Aki’s shoulder, and the brothers cried all the harder at the deepening roar of the heavens. The harshest weight of the Western drought had rested on their shoulders alone since late that spring, and though it was finished at last the two princes had been altered for ever. 

As Makoto drew back to take Shamlal’s reins, the walls of the city flashed crimson and white, followed a moment later by violet and gold—for the skies were aglow with fire where they had been black with rain, and so the Qasrian stared up at the light in wonder until it grew too fierce to bear. 

“A firestorm, then,” said Asahi, trotting up behind him. The young soldier’s voice was raw and weak from shouting, and as Makoto turned to face him he saw that his lips were trembling. “I have never known a lovelier sight in all my days than this.”

“Aye,” murmured Ikuya, taking his friend’s hand in his own. Aki and Haru rose to their feet and came to join them, and together they stood silent and still as the first bolt struck the earth perhaps three miles south of the citadel. 

They said nothing more for a time, for though their hearts were alight within them their joy was too dear for speech. Aki had been wholly entrapped by the spell of the beauty above them, and though they ought to have been well on their way to the western quarter he made no move to go on. Haru had forgotten the patrol entirely, as well as the state of his robes; he and Makoto were standing side by side in the mud, with Makoto’s damp arm curled round his waist to keep them both from slipping. 

Perhaps the lads were bound by the light of the storm, but one at least was not—for despite his guardians’ efforts small Milad was soaked to the skin, and after wondering for a minute that Haru had not realized it he beat his small fists and wailed. The guardsmen jumped to attention at the cry, and as Milad continued to sob Haru took to his heels and bolted off to the place where Muna had fallen asleep again. Aki stirred from his rapture and sighed before marching away to Shamlal, who was eyeing her dark-haired master as if she feared for his wits. 

“It is ill for the beasts to stand here so long in the damp,” he called, clambering into the saddle. “There will be no evening patrol tonight, but the guard at the gate shall be doubled until the rains are over.”

With that they turned and rode back to the eastern wall, where they were welcomed with shrieks of joy from the townsfolk gathered in the streets. Men and maidens alike were weeping, with little thought of who might chance to see them—for Sahrastan’s long trial had drawn to an end at last, and the truth of it was dear as a blessing to every soul in the kingdom. It took the guards  nearly an hour to return to the palace, for the crowds in the city were so thick that they were obliged to dismount again and lead the camels up to the gates on foot. Milad had quieted his crying at last, and now he sat crossly in the little basket hung from Haru’s back. Every now and then he glared up at the skies as if they had displeased him, and the lads following behind burst into laughter at the sight. 

“You will never be so glad for the rain, thank Heaven,” sighed Haru, standing still so that Makoto could take the baby into his arms. “For you will grow to manhood in Qasr,  _ radhiy,  _ but every year I will wait for word that the rains have come and gone as they ought to do.”

When the guards bowed them past the perimeter walls they surrendered their camels to the headsmen, who led the beasts away as the soldiers hurried through the doors and into the warmth of the palace. There they found that candles were burning at every window as they always did during the monsoons, and an army of manservants were lighting the hanging lamps that swung from the golden ceiling. Makoto surrendered small Milad to Jun and rushed off with the others to the armory, where they cast off their hauberks and mail and rid themselves of the jerkins beneath. 

Before long they were dry and dressed again, and when they went back to Haru’s chambers in the eastern wing they found Jun sitting cross-legged on Aki’s bed with Milad sleeping in her lap. She was loath to relinquish him for a while, but that did not matter at all, for Rei and Aki came bolting in to join them twenty minutes later in a pair of dancing-tunics. The moment Rei crossed the threshold he made a beeline for Haru and laid his head in his master’s lap, and so with Haru on one side and Aki on the other he too began to weep just as the guardsmen had done. Makoto felt a keen sting in his breast at the sight of them, for the Iwatobians lay as if their bodies had been molded to the touch of their brothers’—as if a single bloodstream ran like a thread of ambrosia between them, or perhaps the three lanky figures curled on Haru’s mattress were simply governed by a single thought. 

And now come spring they would be parted, and Rei and Haru cloven from the plains of their birth like two buds cut from their stems. Worse was their parting from Aki, for Makoto had seen the pain in the crown prince’s eyes when Haru was elsewhere, and though Makoto himself had walked the halls of Sahrastan with his head in the clouds there was one who had perhaps been dealt the greatest blow of his life. The Qasrian knew his intended’s love for the West as if it lived within him, and for a moment he wondered if Haru would ever know joy in Sardahan—if even the brightest of hellebore and lover’s grace could grow as dear to him as the heat of the desert sands, and whether Makoto’s own heart could hope to take the place of all that Haru had adored for the past nineteen years and more. 

So it was that when the day had gone and darkness fell on the city the two princes were lying side-by-side in Haru’s bed—without Milad between them, for though the streets were running with water the warmth of the evening had grown unbearable. Milad was fast asleep in his little cot by the mattress, and while Haru’s rose-leaf eyelids had closed on the chamber long ago Makoto still remained awake. He rested against the wall with his arm across Haru’s waist, brushing the curve of his satin cheek with the point of one sunbrowned finger. 

“Would that it might be otherwise,  _ rouhiya _ ,” he whispered sorrowfully. “If you chose to remain I would love you just as dearly, and depart my court to wed you be it their will or nay. But I would not have you know a moment of sadness while I draw breath, nor after—and it is hard indeed to know I cannot spare you this.”

It was then that Haru’s sweet mouth turned up at the ends and smiled—and Makoto was so stunned by the movement that he sat gaping as his beloved opened his eyes and turned up his face to kiss him. 

“Sadness?” murmured the Iwatobian, pushing himself up on his elbow so that his lashes and Makoto’s were a hairsbreadth apart. “See the heart I have won, my darling! warm as the summer and bright as the sun, and I would not leave it again if I had to lose my own life to keep it.”

“I am taking you from all you have ever known,” said Makoto, glancing down at his hands. “If I—” He stopped in his tracks and fell silent for a second time, staring down in bewilderment as Haru laughed and laid a white hand on his cheek. 

“I want to plant a garden,” he breathed, and the wind faltered in the Qasrian’s breast as Haru’s blue eyes grew damp. “I want to kneel in the grounds of Sardahan to tend a bed of seedlings in goodly soil, and watch them bloom in a riot of color beneath the light of the Eastern sun. I want to run between the blackberry bushes with Ran and Ren and Hayato, and lay my hands on the head of a flower without thorns drawing blood from my fingertips as they always do with cactus-blossoms—to look upon birds and butterflies in a grove of sighing willows, and welcome the rains as the course of a day and not my kingdom’s deliverance from ruin.

“But still I would have no heart for these things, my  _ shamsal _ , if you were not with me. You are my  _ almas _ , my darling, the jewel of my eyes—the joy of my days, the moon of my slumber and the breath in my body. Look in the glass, my beloved, and upon your own self as you are! enough and more to cure the worst of sorrows, and I would forsake my kingdom for a cave if you chose to dwell there beside me!”

For a moment Makoto sat speechless, but when Haru bent down to kiss him once more he surrendered himself wholly—and as he fell back against the cushion with the song of the heavens above him he longed for the day of their wedding as he had longed that past fortnight for the touch of Haru’s kind hand on his own. 

* * *

So it was that the Qasrians’ remaining sojourn in the West passed by in a whirl of sunlit gaiety, and before Haru himself had realized it his friends were readying for their departure. But before the party could go a single ceremony remained, and that was Rei’s handfasting to Nagisa, which ought to have taken place before the Iwatobians were made to flee from Qasr. 

Aki and Haru dressed their brother in heavy silks and satins despite his shrieking protests, for although the lad was only a servant in name he was granted the title of lord, and after the six of the royal family no word carried more sway in Sahrastan than his and his father’s. Nagisa would not consent to be parted from his beloved as the poor steward was adorned from head to foot, and so once Rei was finished with the princes fell upon him, hanging long strings of rubies from the dancer’s ears and a golden chain round his neck, setting off the  _ lauha’s  _ hues to perfection like the sheen of the red gown above them. 

“And now you are ready,” said Aki, whose voice was thick with tears. “Surely it must be Mother Isha’s blessing, that you two found one another so—” Haru set a hand on his shoulder to soothe him, and once the crown prince had dried his eyes both he and his cousin placed solemn kisses on the bridegrooms’ foreheads. 

“Go well, Rei son of Setsuya, and honor your beloved as he deserves,” said Haru, marking Rei’s pale brow with vermilion. Aki did the same for Nagisa, and then with Haru leading the procession and Aki behind the four lads marched down to the emperor’s shrine. The Qasrians were all assembled there already, from the Makoto and Sei down to Momo and the children—and at the head of the room three figures sat waiting by the altar. Two of course were Rei’s own parents, Setsuya and Zahra Ryuugazaki, and the third of the group was Masoto; Nagisa’s father had not come to the West to see him, as the lad would be married a second time in the East, and so the sultan knelt by the pyre as guardian in his stead. Hiromasa would speak the vows as head of the Nanase clan, to which Rei belonged by rights. When the promised pair had crossed the length of the room and came to kneel by the altar he cleared his throat and spoke, opening the ceremony according to the Western fashion. 

“We have assembled to witness the joining of a son from my house with a child of the East,” he said gently, scarcely veiling a smile as Setsuya laid Rei’s pale hand in Nagisa’s. “Rei of the Ryuugazaki clan and Nagisa, only son of the honorable Master Hazuki—have you come before the Goddess and your lords to be wed with willing hearts?”

“I have, Majesty,” said Rei, bowing his dark head to the king. Nagisa answered in kind, and with that Aki came forth to place a gold ring starred with garnets on his brother’s open hand. 

“With this token I wed thee, jewel of my heart,” murmured the steward, placing the ring on Nagisa’s third finger. “And to thee I give my love from now until our spirits are unmade at the Forge—the strength of my hands until the life has gone from my body, my blood in thy defense until the last of it is drained, and all the wealth that is due me whether it be a prince’s hoard or a pauper’s. I shall be your champion and your comfort in all things, my darling, and from this day forth to the last under Heaven my house and my name are yours, as is my hand as bridegroom.”

He stopped and picked up the end of his sash to wipe his eyes, but Nagisa choked out a laugh and dried his beloved’s face with his own soft white hands. 

“Oh,  _ rouhiya _ ,” he whispered, reaching out with trembling fingers to take Rei’s ring from Makoto. It was a simple circlet of silver, and though his hands were shaking so that he could hardly keep hold of the thing it lay sparkling against Rei’s twin amethysts hardly an instant later. 

“With this gem I name you my husband, Rei-chan,” he said, smiling so widely that Rin burst into tears in the seat behind them. “By the Goddess I swear to follow you wherever you see fit to roam, as long as I have legs to walk upon—and after, my love, for even when we are ninety I shall be small and light enough to ride on your shoulders now and then! I give the rights of my name to you as you have sworn yours to me, and all the rights to my heart in this world and the next. Your place in my house was granted the day I asked you to wed me in Huzayran, but now it is yours by custom, and it will be the dearest joy of my life to see you claim it.”

“Then by my right as lord of the West I name you bonded, my sons,” said Hiromasa. “You both shall be one in all ways, never to be parted, for all who love you have witnessed your troth and blessed you in sight of the Goddess.”

The two damp faces drew together like flowers seeking the sun, and though the festival chamber had erupted into cheers the minute Aki and Jun were pronounced husband and wife it was not so for Rei and Nagisa. The others stood in silent awe until the lads were parted, and when Momo grew tired of the quiet and leapt off his cushion with a whoop the rest followed close behind him. 

There was no wedding luncheon, for neither of the bridegrooms had consented to have one. After the handfasting the youths went up to the seventh-floor terrace for a while to riot in peace, but the newly-wedded pair hardly noticed a thing save one another. Rin had not stopped weeping since the ceremony, and while Rei stood by the balustrade in Nagisa’s embrace the advisor sat sniffling in a corner with Sakura patting his arm. 

“I have not heard fairer wedding-vows than theirs in all my life,” he cried, burying his face in his sleeve. “Not even our own—”

“That is because you would rather do anything at all rather than bare your heart to any save me, my love,” laughed Sakura, laying her cheek against his. “And mine were fair enough, you know—perhaps you have only forgotten.”

Meanwhile Haru and Makoto were sitting by the rails with Milad, peering out between the pillars and down to the city below. The Qasrian’s brown fingers were tangled loosely with Haru’s pale ones, and from where he stood by the door Aki could tell that only a single thought was present between them, looking through the remaining months of winter and the first three of the spring to Haru’s twentieth birthday and his coming-of-age, which was the soonest Hiromasa would permit his nephew to be wed. The dark-haired prince knew well enough that his cousin would not consent to remain any longer in Sahrastan, and the truth of it was both bitter and sweet. 

After all, the flames of love were not unknown to Aki himself. He still recalled the weeks he spent weeping in his bed when he was a boy of fifteen, after Jun’s family had chosen to take her from the palace and pass the next eight years in their northern estate a province away. Haru and Rei had hardly left his side through the worst of it, and they mourned for his grief as they mourned for the loss of their sister—who then was he to mourn their going, when the joy they would find in the east would be dearer than all they had loved in the west?

_ You hold my heart in your hands with his, Makoto _ , he thought, his lips curling into a pale-half smile as Haru laid his head in Makoto’s lap.  _ Guard it well. _

He went back to his chambers with Jun not long after that, and for the third time that day the two walked nearly all the way to the room Aki had shared with his brothers before recalling that now they had their own quarters three corridors further to the north. Both prince and princess had been well-pleased by their wedded apartments, for they boasted three inner rooms and panelled windows that stretched from the ceilings to the floor. Jun turned round to face him the moment the double doors fell shut behind them, setting her hands on her hips as he threw himself over the window-seat and stared out over the glinting roofs beneath them. 

“What is ailing you, Aki?” she asked, sitting cross-legged on the seat by his head. She stooped to kiss the tip of his pointed nose and let her fingers trail through his hair, an idle grin toying with her lips as she remembered how he had once cut half of it off with a sword in their childhood. 

“They are your brothers, too, and dear to you as they are to me,” he answered, turning his cheek into her palm. “And here you are cool as a lily, whilst I am losing my wits. How is it that you are so unselfish, Jun? Rei is married, and Haru was as good as wed a month after he journeyed to Qasr—and both of them beloved, but still I cannot think of letting them stray from my side again.”

“I mourn their going already, sweetheart,” whispered Jun, unknotting the blue ribbons woven through Aki’s tresses. “I missed them so, these last eight years. I found them gone upon my return, and it was all I could do to wait until they came back from the east again. And when they did—”

“Aye,” said Aki, rising up on his elbows to take her into his arms. He frowned at the silvery tear that crept from the corner of her lashes, and suddenly he knew nothing but remorse that he had grieved her again. 

They lay back beneath the silken drapes, cheek to cheek as they gazed silently up at the vaulted ceiling. Beneath their heads the locks of their hair flowed together until the two could no longer be told apart, mahogany mingling with inky black like a bough against the heavens. 

“I think I will grow to bear it, in time,” murmured the prince. “They are blood of my blood and sons of my clan, but I did not vow the name of  _ jaanya  _ to them, my darling.”

“Nor I,” smiled his wife, and as he brought her smooth hands to his lips it seemed that her eyes were aglow like a bed of stars, wedding his joy to have loved her with the careless light of their childhood. And at last when he turned up his face to hers he knew that he need never dread his brothers’ departure as he did—for here was a soul dearer to him by far, who had spoken before the lords of five kingdoms to pledge her heart to his keeping. 

“Then let us say no more about it,” he sighed, squinting against the light until he found the tasseled cord that shut the curtains. “For you are the only one I wish to think of today, my love, and after spending eight years robbed of your sight I scarcely dare blink for fear I’ll find you gone again.”

“I could not leave you now, certainly,” said Jun, laughing as he rose from the cushions and carried her into the second chamber. She put her hand over his heart as he set her down on the threshold, for the image of her married crest still shone beneath his tunic with her maiden sigil above it. “I need never obey the will of the Kirishima clan again—for I took your name as I took you for mine, and none save ourselves shall govern us now.”

“Then what is your will, my  _ mallika? _ ” questioned Aki, nearly falling to his knees at the lilt in her voice. He met only silence when he spoke, and when he hailed her again she gave him no reply—or none that the prince could hear, at least. 

So it was that when Haru came to fetch them for supper he withdrew from the door to their quarters empty-handed, walking swiftly back to his own apartment to dine with Makoto alone. He did not see Aki and Jun again until late in the afternoon the following day, and though he had glimpsed the soft light in their faces he swallowed his laughter and said nothing about it. 

* * *

On the third morning after Rei’s wedding the Qasrians departed the palace, taking their leave of the Nanase clan with embraces enough for all and a promise to write the moment they returned to Sardahan. Their leaving was shadowed by sorrow, especially for Rin and the Mikoshibas, for all five of them had made fast friends in the citadel. Seijurou had grown close to Asahi and the three Kirishima boys while training on the field, and though Gou could not fathom why Rin found a steadfast ally in Lord Aichirou of the dancing-guild. But still the two lads had sworn to send letters back and forth as often as they might, and just before Rin vaulted up onto his camel on the terrace Ai reached out and grasped his arm. 

“ _ Haza saieda _ , Lord Matsuoka,” he said, shaking Rin’s hand for all he was worth. “You will do well in the spring, and in all my days I never saw a soul go on as well as you did.”

“I thank you, Ai,” sniffled the advisor, who looked as if he would burst into tears the moment the dancer’s back was turned. “It was all your doing, for Nagisa has not your patience, and Sakura—”

“What upon earth do you mean?” asked Makoto, perplexed. “What was his doing, Rin—and what will you be about in the spring? And why did Lord Aichirou bid you good luck?”

“Mind your own affairs, if you would be so kind,” wailed Rin, throwing himself on Makoto’s shoulder. “He can wish me luck if he likes, can’t he?”

“Very well,” soothed the prince, hugging his weeping friend until he gulped and wriggled away. Rin set upon Haru next, straining the Iwatobian in his arms until he began gasping for breath.

“Bring Makoto back to the East,  _ bhaiya _ ,” he begged. “He would live all his life in Sahrastan if you chose to remain, but I fear that not one of us could live without him.”

“Aye, I will,” said Haru, poking Rin in the side until he squeaked and released him. Another chorus of sobs met the young prince’s ears, and he too began to cry as the twins rushed into his arms.

“Come back soon, Haru-chan,” wept Ran, whose small face was buried to the ears in Makoto’s sash. “You promised us, and you must keep your word!”

“Wild horses could not drag me away,” he choked, kissing the top of Hayato’s sash. “Four moons are nothing, sweetheart—you will have me for the rest of your days after my coming-of-age, but until then you must wait, my darling.”

At last the whole of the party had been bundled into their saddles, and as the Iwatobians stood waving by the steps the camels trundled out through the palace gates and down into the streets below to begin their long journey back to Qasr. Makoto sighed as the portcullis fell shut in his father’s wake, for despite his joy at remaining with Haru through the spring he found that he missed his family desperately the moment they left his sight. 

“Come, my love,” whispered Haru, taking Makoto’s brown hand in his. The elder prince looked down at the touch and turned to face his beloved, lifting his palm to his mouth to kiss it before following the Iwatobian back inside. As they crossed the threshold he threw back his head and laughed, for the truth of Haru’s words to Ran had been made plain to him at last—four moons were nothing in the span of all the days he would pass under Heaven, and though he was parted from all he had loved for the first twenty-one years of his life the two he loved most of all shone forth like a flaming beacon beside him. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UP NEXT...well, we all know what's up next. Expect Chapter 19 (and a certain prince's wedding) near the end of June! Please leave a comment if you like! I love hearing what you think, and see you next time!


	19. Take My Hands In Thine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our princes are joined in marriage, and this tale draws nearly to its end.

_Five Months Later_

*    *    *

Makoto had often wondered how the folk of Sahrastan could love their country as they did, for his own spirit nearly shriveled to think of a desert languishing in the sun without so much as a leaf in sight, and a sky so harsh in its judgment that a hundred cities might perish of thirst below it. He knew only the worst of the badlands before he followed Haru across them, having grown to manhood in Qasr with the tales of traveling merchants who scarcely emerged from the West alive.  

But he had heard nothing of heavens so wide that palaces vanished beneath them, and flowers fairer by far than the ones that bloomed in the East—nothing of the stars that burned overhead like a goddess’s hoard of silver, and certainly naught of an _alcazar_ built of marble and gold so bright that they shone like the sea at sunrise. So it was that when he took his leave of Iwatobi in the spring he wept to see it fade into the dust in the caravan’s wake, but to his astonishment Haru himself did not shed a tear. Makoto marveled aloud at his beloved’s laughter when they stopped for luncheon on the first afternoon, but Haru only shook his head and filled a bowl for them to share.

“Why ought I to weep, my darling?” asked the younger prince, perplexed. He laid his cheek on Makoto’s shoulder and looked up into his eyes, and as ever the glance was balm to the Qasrian’s heart like tallow soothing a wound. “Sahrastan is worth very little alone, _amarya._ All my kin are here beside me, and every friend I loved from my youth save the ones I met in Sikandar.”

“Aye, you are right,” smiled Makoto, feeding Milad a mouthful of roasted meat. The baby suffered his ministrations for only a minute longer before snatching the spoon for himself and finishing his meal alone, nibbling steadily at the contents of his dish until he had downed them all.

The past five moons had brought little change to Makoto and Haru, save perhaps the new lightness in Haruka’s eye—and even less to Nagisa and Rei, who were as much themselves as ever. But Milad was close upon his second birthday, and he relished the mischief of his age where once he had obeyed his father’s every word. The small prince had grown in both wisdom and body, chattering gaily in the common tongue without so much as a lisp to hinder him. Haru had been greatly surprised when he bundled the child into his tub one evening and heard a high-pitched protest in the Western speech, and so Milad nearly escaped his dreaded bath before the Iwatobian recalled his wits and caught the little one in his tracks.

“ _Shiro?_ ” asked the child, glancing this way and that for his beloved sweet-rice pudding. Haru laughed and shook his head, taking his son on his knee so that Makoto might hold them both together.

“You will have to wait until Qasr, sweetheart,” he said, kissing the baby’s dimpled cheeks until he kicked his feet in the sand for joy.

Aki smiled at the sight of them, for though he had grown used to the peal of Haru’s laughter he never ceased to cherish it. He glanced up at the pale-blue sky as a nasir’s call echoed down from its depths, heralding the shade of Alsiya’s wings as she hunted a serpent through the dunes. Haru had killed an _afhiya_ for the eagle so that she might not stray too far from the caravan, but to her young master’s astonishment she spurned the thing and went to catch another.

“Do not laugh at me!” grumbled the prince, observing the spark in his cousin’s eye as he lay back to watch Alsiya wheel overhead. “Hiro would have taken the meat from my hands, and you remember as well as I. How ought I to have known that she would not eat of it?”

“Hiro was close upon his twenty-third year when he came to you, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” chided Aki. “And Sayf is nearly twenty, but still she would never take so much as a morsel from the falconers outside the walls of the keep. Alsiya is more of her mother, and no huntress would permit even the kindest of men to tame her. They are like women, my brother, and every one with pride befitting her standing—why ought she to make herself beholden, when it is you who asks for her aid?”

“What does he mean?” asked Kashi, crawling into Haru’s lap so that he and Milad sat side by side. “Alsiya is nothing like a maiden at all.”

“Neither are swords, but that means nothing in Aki’s book.” laughed Haru, shutting his eyes in contentment as Makoto kissed the top of his head.

“Aye, I remember that,” mused Jun, giggling like a child as Aki began to flush. “What was it he used to say? That swords were like women, and that if we failed to love them they would never give up their secrets—what secrets lie in the blade of a _kaskara_ , my heart?”

“More than you know, _jaanya_ ,” sniffed Aki, turning up his nose. “Haru, hush your laughing! _Haru!_ ”

Haru turned his face into Makoto’s gown and shrieked with glee until Aki’s ears were crimson, and once his mother began to snicker the crown prince put on his long veil and kept it over his face until the party moved off again an hour later.

*    *    *

“Can you see them yet, Rin?”

“It is only noon, Momo—”

“Now?”

“ _Momo!_ ”

Rin sighed and peered through his spyglass for the sixth time that hour, squinting away at the dusty horizon for Makoto’s caravan. The prince’s company was due to arrive by the fourth bell that afternoon, but still the long-suffering advisor had spent the morning on the terrace so that might see his friend’s arrival no matter when he chose to appear. Sakura had joined him after luncheon, perching on a bench by the flowerbeds whilst he sat and paced by turns. Momo came running across the gardens to find her scarcely two minutes later, and once he was missed in the dancing-hall Malka and Lili were sent to fetch him. Not one of the four performers returned to their work that day, and after the children had finished their lessons they fled the schoolroom to take their places on either side of Sakura.

Gou had elected to remain in the cool of her quarters, for though her young charges welcomed the warmth after the chill of the last three moons she had been forbidden to sit out of doors for long. Her brother had been loath to leave her side all that winter, for fear she should strain herself by carrying a book too many or miss a step on the stairs. At last the scholar had banished him from her chambers, shaking her head at his back as the advisor began to sulk.

“At this rate you will grow pale as snow before your first glance at your nephew’s face,” she laughed, flinging an embroidered shawl at his head as Seijurou sat grinning at her feet. “You will be a father yourself one day if you are lucky, and Sakura will not suffer your worry as patiently as I have.”

“Patience indeed,” scoffed Rin, dodging the square of filmy cloth so that it drifted to the ground. “Very well, then—Sei will have to look after you in my stead, fool that he is, and if you want for a single thing from now until Subat your husband shall suffer my wrath.”

“Oh, go away,” said Gou, turning away to the open window before he caught sight of the tender look in her eye. Rin’s worry had been trial and amusement at once to both husband and wife during their courtship, but still it had never ceased to gladden them.

“Do you see them yet, Rin-chan?” said Momo, breaking into his brother-in-law’s musings by tugging at the older boy’s sleeve.

“ _One_ more word, Momo—”

The advisor snatched his spyglass out of his girdle and threw it at Momo’s face, muttering an oath when the instrument fell into a rosebush instead. Ran and Hayato jumped off the bench and went to claim the glass for themselves, quarrelling over the thing until Ren plucked it out of Hayato’s pocket and ran away to the balustrade.

“You might as well go in, my heart,” called Sakura, laying a hand on his arm. “It will be close to evening before they arrive, and surely the manservants will have need of you to aid them with the last of the preparations.”

But Rin did not stir, and so the Qasrians sat still as mice as the warm afternoon drew on. At last when the sun was half-sunk in the sky a cloud of dust rose up in the distance, shining silver as the sun danced off a forest of spears and the helms of a hundred guardsmen.

“There they are!” cried Momo, bouncing up like a jack-in-the-box as he went to stand by the parapet. “Look, onee-chan!”

Rin nearly flung himself over the rail in his eagerness as the others crowded close on either side, and half an hour later he tumbled into Makoto’s arms as the Western party rode up the winding path from the town and dismounted on the terrace.

For a while there were tears and cries of welcome from all and sundry, but at last they withdrew indoors to flee the chill of the twilight and continue their work for the wedding six days hence. Of course the advisor threw back his head and bellowed when he was given another host of duties, but by then his friends knew well enough that he did not mind it at all—and so they only laughed at his ire, carrying about their business as usual until they retired for the night.

*    *    *

“ _Haru_ ,” chided Aki, tugging at his plaits in despair. “You cannot be together during the _lauha_ , and you know it as well as I do. Makoto must not see your paint until after the handfasting, and it matters nothing that he is a man and not a maid.”

“Nay,” said Haru. He turned away and folded his arms, glaring at the empty fireplace. “If he does not sit in the room beside me, there shall be no _lauha_ at all. There need not be, you know, for here in Qasr there has never been such a custom.”

“Jun!” wailed his cousin, turning to his laughing wife with a frown. “Make him see sense, I pray you! He is still prince of Sahrastan, whether he weds in the East or no, and for him to be married in the Western way he _must_ be painted before!”

“Haru-chan,” coaxed Nagisa, bounding onto the bed at Aki’s right. “I know that Mako-chan wished to have a _lauha,_ too. Would you deny him, then?”

“Then he shall be painted beside me,” rejoined the prince. “He would not mind it at all.”

“Only because he knows no better,” groaned Aki. “Tell him, Rei—”

“Why?” inquired the younger lad. He glanced up from the compendium of herbs on his lap and sighed, lifting his spectacles to the bridge of his nose to survey the elder boys through the glass. “It is as he says, is it not? He will be crown prince of Qasr once he and Makoto are married, so he need not keep all the Western customs—and if it pleases him to have his beloved in the chamber, why ought I to protest?”

“There!” cried Haru, pointing at his friend. “Did you hear? He sees the matter as I do!”

Aki sent Rei a woeful look and fell face-down on Milad’s pillow, muttering into the cover as Jun shook her head with a sigh.

“You are fools, all three of you,” she said. “Certainly Haru and Makoto cannot see one another’s paint before the handfasting, but—”

“Jun!”

“Hold your tongue, Haru,” ordered Jun, inspecting the pearls on her wedding ring without sparing a glance at her brother-in-law. “You _shall_ be together for the ceremony, but there must be a curtain between you. It is ill luck to look on the sacred lauha before the wedding day, so you must face the opposite wall and sit with your back to your bridegroom.”

The three boys coughed and averted their eyes for shame at their foolishness, setting the princess to laughing as Makoto put his head round the frame of the open door.

“What is the joke, sister?” he asked, catching Milad up in his arms and tossing him into the air. The small boy shrieked out in glee and clutched at his father’s shoulders, giggling into the prince’s neck when Makoto brought him down again.

“ _Hush!_ ” cried Haru, flushing scarlet as Jun opened her mouth. He sprang off the bed and went to greet his betrothed, standing on pointed toes to kiss Makoto’s cheek. “It is nothing, Makoto. But the first rite has been altered, my love—there is to be only one _lauha,_ with both of us together.”

“Aye, it is better so,” said the Qasrian. “Else our friends would have had to split themselves between us, and not a one of them wished to do such a thing. This is the only _lauha_ the East might ever see, and Rin has already torn out nearly half his hair at the thought of forgoing yours.”

“I never thought of that,” said Aki sheepishly. “But who will sit beside you for the ceremony, Makoto? Haru and Rei were unmarried when my own was held, but you are the last of your friends to be wed.”

“Not quite,” laughed Makoto, setting his hand in Haru’s as Milad scrambled down to the floor. “It will be another year yet before Momo can ask for Malka’s hand, and of course there are the children. Whom will you have, Haru-chan?”

“Kashi,” answered Haru, grinning from ear to ear as that small individual came marching into the room with Ran, Ren, and Hayato behind him. The little sentry had become great friends with the three elder children when the Qasrians visited Sahrastan, and the band was glad indeed to be together again. To them it mattered nothing that Kashi was only six, and so the child had forsaken his liege to pass the time with the twins.

“What is it, Haru-chan?” he asked, bounding up to Haru’s side and falling into his lap. Milad shouted the small lad’s name as if to demand his company, and so Kashi pulled the baby from Makoto’s knee to his own as he nestled back against Haru’s shoulder.

“You will sit with me for the _lauha_ , will you not?” smiled the prince, laying a hand on Kashi’s head. “I am the last of my brothers to marry save one, and he shall not come of age for another fourteen years.”

“Oh, yes!” cried Kashi, bouncing in Haru’s arms. “Will his Highness draw a lion for me, Haru-chan? Only a very little lion would do, if it had golden fur.”

“Aye, one with a wonderful mane and eyes as yellow as Alsiya’s,” promised Haru. “And as many flowers as you please, _shin’ainaru-ko_ , if you would like to have them.”

“What of me?” asked Ran, joining Kashi in Haru’s lap as Hayato and Ren made a beeline for Rei’s. “Whom shall I go with, _onii-chan?_ ”

“You may sit with whomever you choose, my Ran,” chuckled Makoto.

“Then I shall sit beside Haru-chan,” she declared, “For—” The small princess stopped in her tracks as if she could not bear to go on, and so the others never discovered what she had meant to say; instead she stifled a sob and laid her cheek over the prince’s heart, shutting her eyes at the sound of the steady pulse beneath her. Haru kissed the top of her head and set his chin in her hair, for he felt as if he too would weep as his eyes fell again on the carven jewel that sat on her little hand. She and Hayato had not dared put on their betrothal rings outside their own chambers before Haru’s return from the West, and since the day the trinkets were exchanged so long ago the two children had worn them on silver chains round their necks. But now the crimson ruby that Haru had chosen for Ran shone forth like a sunbeam on the finger it was meant to grace, while Hayato’s pale-blue topaz glittered beneath the open sky like a piece of its own reflection.

“That is settled, then,” said the elder prince, nearly jumping up in astonishment as Nagisa sprawled over his knees. “Tonight we shall all be adorned with the paint, and to-morrow—”

A fair white hand crept over the polished tile at his words, settling against the Qasrian’s arm like rain against the earth of a garden. Makoto’s brown fingers met his intended’s half-way and drew them close to his chest, holding them fast as he turned to look into Haru’s face. The glance that passed between them was one that Hayato and the twins had long since grown used to seeing, but though they cared nothing about it Aki’s ears went scarlet at the sight—for Haru’s cheek had grown dark at the touch, flaming like the leaves of a rose as he took Makoto’s opposite hand in his. He murmured a phrase in the Western speech as he moved, pressing his lips to the wide gold band of the prince’s betrothal ring before kissing the heart of his palm.

With that the poor brother made himself scarce, rising from his place by the fire before making his excuses to Makoto and running for the safety of the hall. Jun nearly burst into laughter again as she looked at the back of his neck, but instead she took small Kashi by the hand and bid farewell to Nagisa and Rei as she slipped out into the corridor to find her errant husband. Ran and Hayato followed only a minute later, giggling into their sleeves as Ran took hold of the sentry’s arm and dashed down the passage after Jun.

Rei and Nagisa did not stir for a while, for the steward had hardly glanced up from his book for the last three hours—and so he saw nothing at all as Makoto’s arm stole round Haru’s waist, pulling the Iwatobian to his side until Haru’s pale cheek was tucked beneath his collar. But Ren still lay with his head on Makoto’s knee and his small hand clasped in Milad’s, until at last Nagisa signaled across the chamber and motioned the little prince to join him. Neither Haru nor Makoto noticed their going, for the curtains made hardly a sound as they fell shut in Nagisa’s wake. But Rei looked up the moment his husband crossed the threshold and closed his dictionary with a snap, sidling out of the room and shutting the door behind him as the two faces by the bed drew together again in the warmth of a lover’s embrace.

*    *    *

Haru and Makoto were left to themselves for the next two hours or so, and as they sat side-by-side on the floor with Milad asleep in Haru’s lap they studied a pair of gilded scrolls that had traveled with them from Sahrastan. Haru’s lips moved almost soundlessly as he traced the fine letters on the vellum, pausing to correct his accent now and then before turning to look at Makoto. The poor lad’s nails were caught between his teeth, and he stumbled over the words on the page with a deepening furrow in his brow. Though he had passed the last four months and a half among the folk of Iwatobi, Makoto had gained very little command of the Western speech; Haru had never spoken it to him during his first five moons in Qasr, preferring instead to converse in the common tongue as most royals did in company. Every child born into nobility was raised with a pair of languages: first the speech of their mother-land, and then the central language (as was its proper name) beginning in the fifth year.

There was much in common between central and Qasrian, and so Haru had little difficulty with the latter after he journeyed to Sardahan—but the Western speech called for hundreds of characters more than Makoto had ever learned, and he was hard-pressed to remember them all at his age. For their wedding day he would have to recite his vows in all three tongues by the altar: first in the speech of his own kingdom and then in Haru’s, and lastly in the common speech so that the foreign delegates could understand what he had promised. But try as he might the fine-drawn sigils on the page would not call up the words in his thoughts, and at last he groaned and dropped his face on his arm as he laid the scroll over his knee.

“What is it, _amarya?_ ” came the gentle voice, followed by a soft touch at his cheek as Haru thrust his own scroll back into its case. Makoto laughed and turned to press the rough palm to his lips, kissing it twice and twice again before heaving a windy sigh.

“These characters,” he chuckled, brushing the only ones whose meaning he knew as he ought—the six signs that spelled his own name and Haru’s, drawn in crimson ink with a sharpened goose-feather quill. “However did you learn them, my love? It is nearly more than my head can bear to commit even a sentence to memory, and when I begin the following line I forget the first one entirely.”

“Is that all?” smiled Haru, taking the sheet from Makoto’s lap. “Give me that pen on the dressing-table, and I will write them out in the common tongue for you. Then it will not matter that you cannot read the sigils, as long as you can repeat the vows as you should.”

Five minutes later the scroll was returned to the Qasrian’s hands, newly adorned with a fourth row of script in dark-blue writing at the foot of the page. To his astonishment Makoto found that the words were simple to recall, now that he could read them for himself, and before the hour was finished he could have recited them front and back without missing so much as a sound.

“How dearly I wished to kneel at the Goddess’s feet beside you someday and set my hand in yours,” whispered Haru, drawing his beloved out of his musings. “Perhaps I wished it even before I knew I loved you, and since then my dreams have grown clearer by the day.”

“Dreams, my heart?” questioned the elder prince, turning fully to face him. “What dreams have you had?”

For a moment he remembered the visions that had plagued him for weeks on end in the fall, visions of Haru face-down in bloody sand with his _kaskara_ lying beneath him, and then his dreams of the autumn festival and Milad dancing away through the crowd to sit by his mother’s grave. At length the second of the two had been allowed to come to its natural end, so that Makoto might look on the face of the one he had chosen to marry, and after the day he nearly strangled the poor brigand who met with Haru in the desert he had not dreamt of his beloved’s passing again. But still he feared that some threat might linger in the far East, deep in the hearts of the men who were stripped of their wealth and titles after Haru was nearly slain—and so he glanced up in worry after hearing his bridegroom’s speech, wondering what the Iwatobian might have seen beneath the cloak of darkness.

“They speak of beauty beyond compare, my _shamsal_ ,” smiled the Iwatobian, tucking small Milad beneath the soft covers on the bed. “I have seen you as you will be twenty years hence, and Milad—and us as we are, my darling, both changed and yet the same as we have always been. How would our son look with a beard, do you think?”

“A _beard?_ ” sputtered Makoto, staring at the soft round face of his child asleep on his pillow. Makoto’s own cheeks were smooth and closely shaven, for by custom men in the East did not keep hair on their faces until past the thirty-fifth year. Even then more than half the lords of Qasr chose to forgo the tradition, though long ago they would not singe off their beards except as a sign of mourning—and so just as Haru had worn his hair cropped short to his neck until that winter, every day before breaking his fast the king took a lighted flame to his skin in remembrance of the steadfast Toraichi.  

Makoto was stilled in his tracks as he thought of the late advisor, for his father had cherished one brother by blood and a second bound only by love, much as Haru did himself. But unlike the third son of his house, the king had been stripped of both brother and dearest friend long ago. Makoto had never known the first of the pair, the uncle for whom he was named, for the vanished prince had perished in battle when Masoto was only seventeen. Toraichi had followed fifteen years later, lost to the depths of the Eastern sea on a summer’s day in Huzayran.

“What is it?” asked Haru, who had seen the change in his bridegroom’s face and knew well enough what it meant—for the same look stole into Haru’s own eyes now and then, heralding the distant memory of a citadel sunk into ash and the death of a silver-haired Queen.

“We shall follow them too, some day,” said Makoto, so softly that Haru could scarcely hear him. “All the ones who came before us. They spent their last so that we might live, and now we guard these halls in their stead.”

To any but Haru himself the Qasrian’s words would have been only foolishness, but he knew in his own queer way what Makoto meant when he spoke them. So it was that they sat together in silence for a while, passing their thought between them with the touch of their palms and fingers. Nor were the princes too weary to converse, for where once their lilting voices rang like music through the air they found that they had no need of talking—instead each heart was plain to the other like sunlight full in the heavens, as if where the princes were twain before they might as well have been one.

“But Milad must never grow a beard,” said Makoto at last, furrowing his brow at the image as Haru burst into laughter. “Not while I draw breath at least, my love—and he must remain my little son for as long as I wish it!”

“Would that we had a say in the matter, sweetheart,” chortled Haru, rising from his place at Makoto’s right before going across to the washroom to draw himself a bath. “But the lad will grow, as children must, and if he makes you a father-in-law by the year you are forty you shall welcome his bride with a smile.”

“ _Haru-chan_ ,” groaned the elder prince, thrilling to the tips of his toes as Haru began to giggle into his hands. “Do not speak of it, _amarya!_ And you are younger than I am, my love, so _you_ might have a daughter as soon as you are eight-and-thirty.”

“I would not mind it, Makoto,” sang the Iwatobian. “I am only twenty yet, and eighteen years is a long while.”

With that he danced off into the bathing chamber and cast off his gown behind the screen, burying himself to the chin in his tub as Makoto waited in the bedroom. He had passed scarcely an hour in his own quarters since their return from the West, for while they were still his by rights the place had been made up for his sister.. After their marriage he and Haru were to dwell in the adjoining guest-chamber where his intended had lived with Rei and Milad long ago, and Rin had forbidden both of the promised pair from entering the apartment on pain of death—before the wedding was finished, at least.

“There, I am done,” said Haru, marching out ten minutes later with a towel tied round his head. “Go on, my heart, and swiftly, for we will be needed in the dancing-hall by the seventh bell.” He took Makoto’s place on the bedspread and woke small Milad from his dreams, bouncing the disgruntled baby in his arms while Makoto vanished behind the curtain to bathe.

At last all three were ready to depart, though Milad was cross as a bear at having been shaken from slumber. Now he was clinging to Haru’s neck like a limpet, hiding his little face from the light as the father drew on his short trousers one-handed. They fell only an inch beneath his knee, so that the _lauha_ might dry unhindered, and the long tunic he wore above them had sleeves cropped short at the elbow. Makoto had not troubled with a short-sleeved gown, for he would remove his robe entirely during the ceremony; by custom his chest would be painted as well as his arms and calves, but Haru had chosen not to color his own for fear of smudging the ink.

They met Rin and Sakura on the stairs down to the entrance hall, and behind them came Seijurou and Gou. Momo and the rest had gone down to the first level long ago, and as they descended to the ground floor they found it lit from the ceiling to the floors—even the windows had paper lanterns hanging in their frames, and as the song of an Eastern hymn rose up like a breeze past their ears the two princes felt as if they had passed into a waking dream.

“There you are!” shrieked Malka, bounding out of an alcove with Hayato and the twins. They too were dressed in loose-fitting clothes, and the glow in their childish faces sent a spark of joy into Makoto’s own heart as they drew on towards the dancing-chamber.

When they came to the doors they saw that the hall had been split in half, parted down the center of the gleaming floor by a curtain of silvery gauze. Every now and then it rippled like a shadow upon the sea as one of the laughing revelers went to duck behind it, for all save the two bridegrooms themselves were free to pass from side to side as they pleased The lamplight poured through the cloth well enough, but though Haru could hear the laughter of the guests on the far end of the room he could see only the palest of shapes where they walked near the shining silk. Three seats stood ready on the northern side, one large and two only half its size, and Rei and Aki were already sitting side by side on a pair of satin cushions with Nagisa and Jun beside them. Makoto reached down for Haruka’s hand at the sight, for slight though it was he felt that even the barrier of the drapes between them would be more than he could bear.

“ _Aiyah,_ Makoto!” cried Momo, rolling out from beneath the curtain and knocking Kashi’s short stool aside. The little sentry sprang up from Aki’s lap and bolted away to right it, for small though it was the painting-ceremony had thrown the child to the very gates of Heaven. He adored his two lords and Rei as if they were of his own blood, and though he had hoped for glory in Aki’s service since he was old enough to toddle he had never so much as dreamed that either of the princes would name him as brother before the folk of two kingdoms.

“Kiss your beloved farewell, Mako-chan,” sang Nagisa, taking hold of Makoto’s wrist and tugging him away toward the silken partition. “Quickly, quickly!”

Makoto flushed crimson before obeying the dancer’s command, following Momo behind the drapes as Nagisa danced along in his wake. Haru remained on the left side of the chamber, gazing at the Qasrian’s long shadow as it rippled across the cloth. At last the likeness of the elder prince came to rest only a foot from where Haru himself was standing, and when they sank down onto their wooden chairs he swore he could feel the warmth of his beloved’s presence as keenly as if their backs had been given leave to touch one another through the curtain.

Once both lads were seated the opening prayers began, led by Kazumi and Tamotsu in keeping with the Iwatobian custom. They finished the first long verse before nodding to Hiromasa and Kaguya, who joined their bright voices in song as the whole of the party from Sahrastan took up the sweet refrain. The music swelled from all four corners of the dancing-hall, accompanied by the notes of a harp and a pair of strings—clear and high and sharply fair like the sound of the Western tongue, matching the pitch of the Western speech like moonlight thrown back from the sea.

*    *    *

_Here sit these two in your grace, O Mother! one born of the sunlit sky at morning—_

_And here our heart’s treasure gone from our halls, our prince hewn like fire from the West!_

*    *    *

“Haru?”

He opened his eyes to find Aki sitting cross-legged on the tarpaulin before him, looking up into his silent face with a single brow uplifted in question. The spell of the dying hymn went slowly from Haruka’s limbs, and so it was a minute or more before he understood that Aki was awaiting his blessing to take the short-bristled brush in hand.

“Aye, you may begin,” murmured Haru. Some great wave of feeling rushed into his heart as the first line of paint adorned the curve of his ankle, yet try as he might he could not fathom whether it was sorrow or happiness—or perhaps a third still unknown to him, greater in power than grief and time and far past the making of either. A moment later he realized that Makoto had gone still behind the satin curtain, and that the lifeblood that flowed between them had borne his own thought to his intended as it so often did of late.

“Oh,” whispered Makoto, and though Haru could not see him he knew that his beloved had bowed his head to his knees, nearly struck down to the earth at the strength of his bridegroom’s love.

But the quivering stillness lasted no longer than a moment, for soon both of the promised pair had fallen to the spell of the _lauha_ as it bloomed on their flesh like starlight, lovelier even than the birds and beasts that had adorned Aki’s body at his wedding that past winter. The crown prince had taken charge of Haru’s long legs, covering them from knee to pointed toes with desert blossoms thickly clustered amongst domes and pointed spires like the ones that stood watch over Sahrastan. As Aki fell to work on the pillars of a balustrade Tamotsu came forth to paint Haru’s arms, filling his hands with willows’ leaves to mark his new tie to the East.

As he came to the left hand his son glanced swiftly up and lifted his third finger, the one that would resume Makoto’s betrothal ring the moment the paint was dry. Hiromasa caught the look and motioned the curious watchers to turn away from the prince, for here was the chiefest moment of the ceremony—the moment where Haru would conceal Makoto’s name in the _lauha,_ to be found by the green-eyed prince himself on the first night after their wedding. None but Haru and Tamotsu were to know where the sigils would lie, and even Aki cast down his gaze as Tamotsu wrote the two characters round the root of Haru’s finger, lying closely against the crown of his palm so the band of the ring might cover them.

“ _Shukraan_ ,” whispered the prince, flushing scarlet as Kashi began to giggle. Rei called a reproof from where he sat before Ran, drawing a chain of water-lilies on the tops of her little feet.

“Look at his _face_ , Rei-chan,” laughed Nagisa, ducking beneath the drapes again with Rin and Gou at his tail. “As red as an apple in autumn, and his ears—”

“ _Nagisa_ ,” chided Makoto, speaking from the other side of the curtain. The word alone was enough to subdue his young friend, and the dancer settled quietly onto Rei’s empty cushion to watch a pair of golden eagles take shape on Haru’s forearms. Tamotsu had tinted the raptors’ feathers with gold, just as Hiromasa had done to the scales of the dragon Aki was given before his marriage—but Haru had chosen to leave the rest of the paint untinted, for all the hues save gold would surely be lost if he did so much as rinse his hands in water. Lapis and malachite would look ill with the robe he had chosen for the handfasting, and though the bright orange and crimson had beautifully suited Aki’s gown they would surely clash with Haru’s costume. For a moment he guessed that Makoto had elected to forgo the colors as well, but that he would not discover until late the following evening—and then he blushed again at the thought of his own name hidden in Makoto’s _lauha,_ wondering whether his beloved had chosen to spell it with Western sigils or the curling script of the East. Tamotsu had written Makoto’s name in Iwatobian, composing the three treasured syllables with the Western word for truth.

Once he had finished with his craft, the good father stepped back and allowed his son to rise to his feet, grinning from ear to ear as a storm of applause broke out from the watching soldiers. Haru held his arms away from his sides and began marching up and down the chamber to dry the dark-brown paint, glancing now and then to the curtain where Makoto’s shadow still sat like a carven figure beyond the shifting silk. From where he stood Haru could see Natsuko’s slender figure bowing over Makoto’s, clearly part-way through the task of painting his chest and shoulders.

“Is it done, my love?” called the Qasrian, tilting his head so that his lashes stood out like a fan below the fine ridge of his brow. Though his intended saw naught but the outline of his body the gaiety was plain in Makoto’s voice, singing sweetly through the dancing-hall like wind borne out of a set of pipes.

“Aye, it is,” smiled Haru, paying no mind to Kashi and Nagisa as the two younger lads smothered their mirth in their sleeves. “How long until you are finished with, _amarya?_ ”

“ _Radhiy_ ,” scolded the queen, putting out a hand to grasp her son’s chin as Makoto turned back to face his beloved. “If you stir another muscle before I am through I shall tell Haru exactly what you asked me to paint, and then—”

“No!” cried Makoto. Rin’s shadow loomed beside his liege’s a minute later, followed by a muffled snicker as the advisor stared at his friend’s broad shoulders with a smirk on his pointed face.

“I think he will like it well enough,” he teased, reaching down to tweak Makoto’s ear. “Sakura, _rouhiya_ —have you seen a prettier ode than this in all your days, sweetheart?”

“Nay, I have not,” came the reply, followed by Sakura’s lilting laughter as the maiden herself appeared at her husband’s right. “If only we had one for our wedding-day! What would you have drawn for me, Rin?”

“Something with fire enough to suit you, my darling,” murmured Rin, drawing his wife close to his side. “A phoenix, perhaps, to match your hair, or garden of golden roses like the ones you used to wear for the autumn festival.”

“Now who is the happy bridegroom, brother?” snorted Seijurou, darting back to Makoto’s side of the curtain to see the shining paint for himself. “To think that a year ago you would have pined into your grave for her sake, without saying so much as a word to win her!”

“Oh, be silent,” grumbled the advisor, burying his red face in Sakura’s hair. “You nearly drove me to my wits’ end with your flirting since we were little lads, so you have no right to speak.”

“Aye, but he spoke as soon as he was able,” laughed Gou. “Whatever do you mean by all this, Makoto?”

“That is for me and Mother to know,” replied the prince, and his flushing cheeks were clear as daylight in the halting pitch of his voice. “And none but Haru to ever find out—or so Aki told me, at least.”

“And you ought not to forget it!” called Aki, shouting over the babble from Haru’s side of the curtain. “Tell those four to turn their eyes away, or I’ll send Rei for another curtain.”

To the Iwatobian’s great wonder Makoto did no such thing, turning back to the drapes instead to lay a hand on the spangled cloth. Haru bent and kissed his palm through the samite, smiling as the lines of the hardened ink brushed the high arch of his brow.

“Only ten minutes more, my love,” said the Qasrian. Haru nearly wept at the weight of Makoto’s promise, wondering if every oath he had from his bridegroom’s lips would ring through his heart as this last had done—if perhaps even such little troths as that meant the world to the soul that had borne them, treasured like stars on a cloudy night for Haru’s joy to receive them.

“Very well,” he smiled, taking a fan from his mother’s satchel to stir up the wind by his feet. “But I will have to go back to my chambers alone when you are finished, and that I can scarcely abide.”

“Oh, spare us your sweethearting, if you love me at all,” cried Rin, who had vanished into the shadows on the far side of the chamber to fetch himself something to eat. “The pair of you might as well have been married a week after Haru came to Qasr last summer, and I have been made to watch you at your foolishness all the while!”

*    *    *

After his second betrothal ceremony in Sahrastan Haru had often dreamed of his wedding, and the moment Makoto’s hand would lie in his before the gilded altar in the temple. But though he thought of it night and day, he had forgotten that all whom he loved in the West would travel beside him to see him wed—and that they would have no mercy in their preparations, caring nothing for his reluctance no matter how fierce it might be. So it was that on his wedding morning Haru was hauled out of his bed at dawn and tossed into a steaming bath before he had opened his eyes, and when he was roused enough to protest he saw that Aki and Rei were standing on either side of the tub with baskets of perfumed oil and a scrubbing-brush apiece.

“Not the brushes!” he cried, shielding his face with his hands. “I will be as red as the sunset, if you do—”

“Aye, and when you are married you need not do as I say,” sang Aki, snatching a flannel and lathering his cousin from head to foot with soap. Rei snorted and set to work with the scrubbing-brush, and though soon the prince’s skin glowed pink as the dawn he lifted his voice and fell to laughing with the rest. From where they sat in the washroom they could hear Tamotsu and Kazumi whispering together in the chamber beyond, giggling like a pair of children as Rei and Aki sweetened the bath with jasmine’s essence. Not even Haru’s inky head had passed his brothers’ inspection, for the moment they finished with his shoulders they brushed his black locks with almond oil until they lay flat down his neck. The prince’s hair had not yet grown long enough to braid with golden ribbons, as was the custom for Western bridegrooms, but still they pulled back a finger’s width of strands from either temple and bound them beneath his crown with an emerald pin.

Once Haru was dry again they set him before the fire to warm him, and while he sat still on a cushion his mother adorned his feet with jewels. A chain of gold and rubies was clasped round each ankle, for the hues of the Iwatobian banner, and a pair of silver rings were slipped onto his toes. Neither of these had a single gem, for the bands were small and slender enough to fit beneath his slippers. Above the shoes the bridegroom wore a pair of satin trousers, dark blue like the silk of his gown and unadorned with stitching save a braided strip round the hems. Tamotsu tied the cords at his son’s waist himself, blinking back his tears as he knotted the shining ribbons so that they curled smoothly against the boy’s skin.

“Do not cry, Father,” whispered Haru, turning his lips to his mother’s cheek as Tamotsu swallowed a sob. “Please—”

“See if you do not weep when Milad is wed,” laughed Kaguya, letting herself into the room with Jun and Hiromasa behind her. Nagisa and Kashi came in their wake with Milad on Nagisa’s shoulders, and at the sight of the prince half-dressed the small sentry burst into laughter.

“You are as red as an apple, Haru-chan,” he crowed, dashing over the polished floor to claim a kiss of his own.

“Oh, hush,” said Haru, rising from his chair as Aki unwrapped his gown. Rei bundled the paper away, and after Haru tugged on his chemise they laced him into the wedding-robe and did up the clasps at his back. His uncle’s eyes grew wide at the prince’s beauty as if he feared to touch him, for Miho could not have sewn a lovelier gown if she tried for the rest of her days. The silken train was two yards long, and from the floor to Haru’s waist she had graced the skirt with the scene of a garden at twilight—with flowers of all colors springing from the grass at the hems, and an apple tree in green and brown spreading its branches over the kirtle’s left side. Crimson fruits were strung like lanterns from the boughs, and hidden amongst the shining leaves two _mynahs_ peeped out to sing farewell to the day. The sleeves were adorned with blooming vines, flowing across his chest and shoulders like shadows over the sea—for the king and his queen had spared no expense, and so the small glinting stars on the silk were diamonds set in silver.

“Here is your sash, my son,” whispered Kazumi, pressing her lips to the prince’s brow as she wound the girdle round his waist. The belt was made of pale green samite, falling to earth with the skirt of his gown like a branch bending down to the soil. She and Tamotsu tied it together, and once their son was fully garbed they drew back and wept for joy.

“Now the jewels,” called Nagisa, who was eyeing the box of ornaments with a fevered glow in his face. He threw it open and pulled out the heavy earrings, which were poured in the shape of peacock’s feathers and hung with golden bells beneath. The metal was enamelled with strips of stormy blue, and dangling round the rims of the bells were strands of white seed-pearls. Haru tossed his dark head as the hooks slipped into his ears, laughing aloud when the starry peal rang out like the voice of a windchime.

“Leave the rest, _rouhiya_ ,” scolded Rei, snatching his husband’s hands away before he could touch the bracelets. Kaguya and Hiromasa took charge of these, sliding them onto Haru’s wrists one by one before adorning his hands with the rings. There were four of them in all, and each with its own significance—first the old band he had worn since his childhood, the sibling’s ring that marked him as Aki’s brother. Next was the seal of the Nanase clan, which he would not wear again after his crowning three days hence—and third came Makoto’s betrothal ring, to be joined that day by a circlet of gold to mark the prince as wedded. Last was Haru’s own sigil as third heir to the Western throne, which he would replace with his wedded seal as one of the rites of marriage.

The rings were followed by a wealth of diamond chains, clasped between the four bands and the bangles to keep them from slipping back. Once the strands were in place, Jun came forth with the silver headdress and set it on Haru’s brow, righting the dangling forehead-piece so that it lay in the center.

“I do not need paint, I think,” said Haru, staring wide-eyed at the slender brush between his steward’s fingers. “Rei—”

“Oh, be quiet,” said Aki, dancing from foot to foot as Rei lined Haru’s dark eyes with kohl. The curves of paint swept up at the ends like a pair of lifted wings, and above them a layer of powdered gold shone yellow and fair by his lashes. With that the two boys stepped away to gaze upon their work, and just as Haru’s father had done they choked and began to cry.

“You are beautiful, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” sobbed the crown prince, kissing the top of his cousin’s head. “Never in all my days—”

Kazumi put up her hand to her eyes before turning to look out the window, which opened upon the garden where the temple stood near the lily pool. Already the shouts and calls from the guests were drifting back to the palace, and from Haru’s room on the second floor they could see the altar’s flame.

“Shall we go?” cried Kashi, frisking from wall to wall as if he would take to the air. “Hurry, Haru-chan, or else we shall miss your entry!”

“Not a chance,” laughed Haru, whirling around and striding away to the door. “Come, lest the chaise departs before me!”

“How might it do so, I wonder?” said Rei, lifting a painted brow. “After all, we are to carry it, and here we are behind you.”

“Go on, then!” shouted Aki, waving an imperious hand. “Mind your step on the stairs, and we shall go in your wake.”

And so Haru turned back to smile at his cousin before crossing the wooden threshold, trailing down the marble steps like a king in sapphires and gold until the party descended into the entrance hall. An army of footmen stood waiting with the sedan chaise that would carry him into the grounds, but at Hiromasa’s command the boys ran off to the southern end of the chamber and stood near the wall to watch. Haru gathered his train behind him and seated himself in the chair, laying his sparkling hands in his lap as each of the men save Nagisa took one of the four carved handles and made to lift him from the ground.

“ _Mama!_ ” cried Milad, wriggling like a worm in his grandmother’s arms as he struggled to slide to the floor. “Me, too!”

“You must ride with me, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” chided Kazumi, brushing his tiny nose. “Your father must go in the chair alone, and—”

“Nay, let him come up with me,” smiled Haru, lifting the child onto his knee. “But you must keep still as a mouse, my heart, and wait until Makoto greets us at the steps before you stir again.”

Milad clapped his small hands and curled back against Haru’s chest, knocking the beads of his carcanet askew as father and son rose up from the tiles together. As Rei and Aki stepped towards the door they heard a great crash and a cry from the level above, and then the flurry of pounding feet as the stairs turned from white to crimson.

“ _Haru!_ ” came a shout from the landing, closely followed by a stream of lads with Miho and Sasabe at their head. “Wait, my lord!”

The prince nearly wept at the sight, for flooding into the gallery were his comrades-in-arms from the Iwatobian guard—and all of them out of breath as if they had run a long way, though this last he could not fathom at all.

“What are the lot of you doing here?” he asked, freeing an earbob from Milad’s grasp as he bent down to speak with Asahi. “You were meant to be at the shrine, were you not?”

“Aye, we were,” sighed the red-haired soldier, throwing up his hands. “But we lost our way to the entrance hall, until Lord Sasabe remembered that it lay on the western face of the castle. And when we found it we thought we might walk alongside you, for you are as brother to us all—if it is no trouble, of course.”

“Trouble?” choked Haru, blinking back the dampness on his lashes. “It is my _honor_ —”

“How dearly we have loved you, my son!” smiled Miho, leaning up to take his hands in hers. “It would be joy to us all to go with you, sweetheart, and I know that not one of our house would relinquish it.”

“Very well, then,” said Hiromasa, turning his face away so that the others would not see him wipe his eyes. “Come, _jundiina!_ ”

Milad cried out for joy as the sedan chair sailed off past the great double doors, clinging fast to his father’s arm as Miho and the rest arrayed themselves as escort. The Iwatobians were joined by a fairer band once they came down to the grounds, for half at least of the palace ladies had run out to walk beside them. Haru called out to Malka and Lili in the crowd, leaning down from his lofty perch so that he might hear their voices better.

“Keep your seat when you see him, Haru-chan,” teased Lili, tweaking small Milad’s nose. “For he is nearly as fair as you to-day, and he would be sorely grieved if he had to keep his bridegroom from falling.”

“I shall do my best,” smiled the prince. He heard his two brothers chuckling before him, and with laughter flowing from their throats like water spilled from a fountain the party drew on to the vaulted shrine where he would be wed at last.

*    *    *

“I never thought I would lead your horse to your wedding some day,” muttered Rin, stifling his tears in a handkerchief as Makoto vaulted onto Nafisa’s back. The white mare was adorned for her weighty task with bronzen bells and ribbons, and though Seijurou had forbidden it her long forelocks were bound with a pair of silver bows. This last was the children’s work, and despite the general’s warnings it seemed that Nafisa did not mind them at all.

“Why?” asked Makoto, steadying himself in the saddle. “I walked beside you for your own, did I not?”

“Aye, but I did not wait three years and a half past my coming of age to marry the woman I loved,” grumbled the advisor. He reached out and took the bridle in hand, tuggling gently on the leather cord to coax Nafisa into a trot.

“Can’t we ride with you, onii-chan?” begged Ren, jumping along at his sister’s heels.

“All four of us would be too heavy for her, _radhiy_ ,” smiled the elder boy, brushing the top of his brother’s head. “Haru-chan would be kept waiting at the shrine for our lateness, and that I could not abide.”

At that the three children bounced ahead to walk before the bridegroom, whispering back and forth until Rin turned to glance at Makoto in question. They returned to the prince’s side only a moment later, chattering at the tops of their voices so that he could scarcely hear them at all—but at last he managed to quiet them as they passed the kitchen courtyard, and before they left it behind them he heard what they wished to say.

“Ran ought to ride with you, at least,” said Hayato, piping up from his place by Makoto’s right. “After all—”

He left his thought unfinished, but still a sob welled up in Makoto’s throat as he bent down to pull his sister into the saddle. The little girl clung fast to the reins as the white mare picked up her pace, and when the bridegroom’s party emerged into the gardens they were met with a shower of petals, white and crimson and pink as the clouds at dawn—thrown by half the folk of the citadel as they drifted down onto Rin’s shoulder’s like snow, filling Hayato’s red hair with perfume as they drew on through the tended paths.

“Makoto!”

He turned and laughed at the gladsome cry, for Seijurou was fighting his way to the front of the crowd with Momo frisking in his wake. The lads from the infantry parted before him, giving him swifter passage through the melee so that both the general and his brother could stand at their liege’s side.

“You did not think you would go to the shrine to be wed without us both, did you?” smiled his friend, clasping Makoto’s hands in his own before yielding his place to Momo. “You have been brother to me since the very day you were born, and so I shall stay beside you until the last vows are spoken.”

Makoto blinked a film of tears from his eyes at Seijurou’s words, dabbing his lashes with a cotton kerchief so as not to smudge his paint. To the many friends of his childhood he had always been dear as family, but in the manner of children everywhere he never once questioned their love—they were as much his own as the flesh and bones that upheld him, but unlike the might of his body the others were there of their own free will, and now he marveled anew at the glow in Rin’s pointed face as he tugged on Nafisa’s bridle.  

As they passed between the flowerbeds the echo of leather striking the ground echoed like a gong behind them, and as one they turned and saw Kisumi pelting up the walkway for all he was worth with his long hair flying behind him. At last he came to a halt at Hayato’s heels and put his hands on his knees, struggling to catch his breath as Makoto’s throat gave up hope of speaking and shut itself up like a clamshell.

“Me, too!” gasped the pale-haired scholar, fighting for air as he clutched at Momo’s shoulder to keep himself upright. “I lost the chance to walk by Sei at his wedding, and Rin—but I shall go beside you now, if only you keep still until I can draw my wind again!”

“Every last one of us was robbed of the joy of seeing _you_ wed, Kisumi,” scolded Sei, cuffing the poor lad round the ears. “What say you to that?”

“Well, I could not help it,” argued the younger boy, springing away from the general’s hands and righting his crumpled collar. “My Miya is a lady, and certainly I could not take her from all she knew in Sikandar without giving myself in marriage—”

“Hush,” breathed Makoto, for at last they had come to the path by the lily pool that led to the open shrine. Through the brick-red pillars he saw a great wreath of flames leaping up from the altar like goldfish dancing in a bowl, and from the faint sweet music of silver bells flowing down from the western terrace he knew that it would be no longer than a minute before Haru arrived at the steps.

“Hurry,” whispered Seijurou, lengthening his stride as Nafisa cantered on through the shower of white rose-leaves. So it was that almost before he realized it Makoto was dismounting before the temple doorway, half-lost among the flying petals as he looked this way and that for his bridegroom. A manservant sprang from the mulberry bushes to the prince’s right and led Nafisa away, glancing back over his shoulder as if in fear that the wedding would be over and done with before he returned from the stables.

As Makoto waited by the foot of the stairs the voices of the bells grew clearer by the second, until he saw a great crowd of men and maidens together pouring between the tended lawns with a carved sedan chair in their midst. A dark-haired figure was enthroned on the teakwood chaise in lonely splendor, or so it seemed at first. A moment later he realized that a small tuft of black and green was bouncing on Haru’s lap, laughing aloud with Aki and the rest as the party drew on to its harbor.

“Milad, _radhiy_ ,” he whispered, and though he could not tell from whence they had come his eyes were full of tears. Behind him Rin gave a valiant sniff before bursting into sobs, and if the glittering vision descending to the tiles had not been nearly close enough to touch Makoto would have set a hand on his advisor’s shoulder to calm him.

“ _Makoto._ ”

The call was soft enough to have gone unnoticed, and perhaps the better part of the assembly never heard it at all—but still it fell singing like the airs of a harp in the shell of Makoto’s ear, and when Kazumi lifted her son from his seat he rose to his full proud height with Milad clutched in his arms. The strength went out of Makoto’s knees at the sight of him standing there, dressed in a robe of fine blue silk and shining from head to foot with diamonds—but somehow the elder prince’s gaze passed over the jewels and gold as if they had never been, rushing instead to Haru’s sweet face and the glow in his glistening eyes.

Not even an age in its entirety would have spared him time enough to converse with his heart as he wished, for where the two princes were bound in nothing more than a loving look they might as well have spoken aloud. But still they could hardly tell what they said, or else the wonder between them was so great in its power that all they had longed to confess had been caught in its trembling beauty.

“ _Haru—_ ”

The name took flight from his lips as if the heavens had willed it, drawing its wind from his breathless lungs as Makoto reached out through the perfumed air and caught Haruka’s hands in his own. The touch was answered by the motion of his bristling lashes, darting down over deep-blue eyes as if to keep back tears _—_ but then they turned to face the doorway and entered the temple together, walking between the satin cushions until they came to the altar where they would be bound in marriage.

*    *    *

The first that Haru knew when his company turned onto the temple path was a prayer of thanksgiving for his brothers walking before him and his father and uncle behind, for if he had undertaken the journey on foot he would surely have fallen senseless to the ground at the beauty of his bridegroom standing beneath the gate to the shrine. Lili’s warning was kindly given, and the moment the prince caught sight of his heart he choked back a strangled sob—for though Makoto’s wedding clothes were plainer than Haru’s by far they were wholly as dear to Haru himself as the gems of his sapphire betrothal ring. The elder lad was dressed in a gown of green and gold brocade, stitched from collar to hems with Qasrian willows that matched the _lauha_ on Haru’s white arms—and above the embroidered silk a sleeveless gold surcoat fell to his feet like a sunbeam, shifting on the tile by his pointed slippers like fallen leaves in the autumn.

As he sat frozen in the sedan-chaise his lashes grew wet with tears, for suddenly the fragrant gardens had gone and left him a boy of nineteen again—nineteen and clad in a silken robe that shone violet and emerald like a peacock’s feathers, standing listless at Rei’s left side before Makoto led him away to dance the _Raqas-Almatar_ until they had scarcely breath enough to return to their places. No garment could have better suited their marriage-day than the one Makoto had worn that night, as near a match for his tender eyes as his fingers were for Haru’s—for though the younger prince was greatly altered by his two seasons’ soujourn in Qasr Makoto remained unchanged, good and sound and gentle as he had always been from the moment his eyes first opened on the sunlit palace of Sardahan. Perhaps it was meant to be so, Haru thought—one who had fallen and risen again like the ocean seeking the moon, and one who was steadfast and mellow and warm like the golden sand by the shore.

He took his leave from the chair almost before he knew he had moved at all, and when his feet in their satin slippers made purchase on the tile he realized that he had spoken—though for the life of him he could not tell what he had said, for upon seeing him there Makoto stopped and breathed his name through the silence like a prayer. The Qasrian’s hand was shaking like a leaf as it caught at Haruka’s palm, but when their long fingers met at last the tremor went from his bones, calmed by the touch of Haru’s cool skin as they turned and made their way between the guests to the altar where they would be wed. Milad bounded along between them, clutching Haru’s green sash in his right hand and the end of Makoto’s long train in the left as he kept pace with both of his guardians. When they came to the plinth where the sultan and queen were standing they knelt on a pair of cushions by the fire, waiting for Tamotsu and Kazumi to join them so that the vows might begin.

Scarcely a minute later the prince and princess of Sahrastan had taken their places by the altar, opening the ceremony with a wedding-hymn in the pointed speech of the Western tongue. Haru shut his eyes and smiled at the sweetness of his mother’s lilting voice, melded inextricably with his father’s own as they sang. Once they had finished the sultan followed in the chorus, accompanied by his wife as all the congregation bent their heads in prayer to the Goddess as the custom was before marriages.  

“ _Thou art the Queen, the gatherer of treasures! first in my heart…”_

Haru repeated the words with lips that had uttered them daily since he was a child of three, needing nothing at all of thought as the ode drew on to its end. But as ever the last line rang through his throat where the rest of the verse had been whispered, for since the day he first understood what he felt for the boy beside him it was Makoto he remembered at the close of the hymn, and not the Goddess at all.

“All that is Good art Thou, thine excellence dwelling in Everything!”

The rest of the crowd noticed nothing, for there were three hundred others joining the worship in the temple alone—not counting the ones who were clustered outside, watching between the pillars from the steps overlooking the lotus pool. When the last echoes died away Masoto began to speak, looking kindly at the lads where they sat as Natsuko dabbed at her eyes with a kerchief hemmed in lace.

“Set your hand in Haru’s, my son.”

They joined their hands again as bidden, flushing scarlet and rose as the sultan addressed the gathering in heavily accented Qasrian—naming the princes and the kingdoms from whence they hailed as his own father had done when he was wed to Natsuko, reciting the terms of betrothal as they had been stated in the contract that Haru’s parents had settled with the emperor and empress the winter before. Tamotsu followed with the Iwatobian tongue and then Kazumi in common, until every soul in the assembly was given a chance to hear what was promised.

“Haru, _radhiy_ ,” said Masoto, smiling gently at his son-in-law with his right hand clasped in his wife’s. “Eleven moons ago I named you a son of my clan—and now it is my joy to make it so by law, sooner than the Queen and I dared hope. Do you come to be wed in the royal house of Sardahan full willing, my lad?”

“Aye, I do,” said Haru, and his voice echoed up to the ceiling as if he had shouted the oath at the top of his lungs. “And so by this handfasting I vow my life to the service of Qasr until my days are ended, my strength to the last for the good of its people until strength has gone from my body—and all my heart’s wisdom at my lord’s command, as is my duty as prince.”

“Then you will have done all your station demands and more, my boy,” replied the sultan. “And you, Makoto?”

“You will not go alone, my heart,” whispered the elder prince, pressing Haru’s palm once before loosing his grip again. “I am your right hand in battle, and you are my voice in the court—I shall be the shield arm and sword for your sake, and you the herald of justice in matters of law for mine. The crown and the rank of my birth shall be given to you by rights, for where once we were twain we both shall be one in the eyes of Heaven.

“Do you assent, my darling?”

“Yes,” breathed Haru, turning to look at Makoto’s face in time to see his bridegroom whisk a stray drop from his cheek.

“Makoto, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” said Tamotsu, calling the lads’ attention as they passed a cup of wine between them to mark the first pair of vows. “For twenty years my son has been the dearest treasure of my kingdom, and now I must have your word that he shall be the same to you—that you will honor my boy as he deserves while you walk amongst the living, for he has forsaken the home of his childhood to pass his days at your side.”

“You have my word, my lord,” said Makoto, and the might of his oath rang out like a bell as he took a gold band starred with sapphires from the weeping Rin and slipped it onto Haru’s third finger. It caught the sunlight like a beacon before joining the flowered betrothal ring, marking them joined before all the assembly as Makoto spoke again.

“With this ring I surrender myself to your keeping, Haru,” he said, and now his throat was choked so that the others could scarcely hear his voice at all. “All that I am, sweetheart, all that I wish—I shall be yours until my spirit is unmade at the Forge, _amarya_ , and after! My heart passed into your hands long ago, and so its lifeblood belongs to you as rays belong to the sun. No hearth shall be mine from this day hence unless you name it your own, for I would perish in the darkness like a _zahr_ robbed of daylight without you—”

He stopped and lifted Haru’s fingers to his lips, gathering some kindly strength from the touch before he could go on.

“You would not abide it, I know, if I dared to kneel before you—but the soul of the prince of Qasr lies at your feet, Haru-chan, and there it shall forever remain!”

Despite himself a single tear broke free from Haru’s black lashes, trickling down to his chin unhindered as Rei came forth with a plain gold ring in a velvet sachet.

“Makoto,” he breathed, lifting the Qasrian’s hand to his breast. The fire in the basin flared up to thrice its height at the sound of Makoto’s name, but Haru noticed nothing—for again the satin trails of their thought were flowing freely between them, wholly forgetting that the vows were to be spoken aloud—

Aki coughed into his palm and prodded Haru’s foot, for from where he sat in the first row with Jun he was close enough to touch him.

“You fled across the desert for my sake, five moons ago,” said Haru, and though he had never been gladder in living memory the sound that escaped his throat was more akin to a sob. “I will follow wherever you choose to roam, my darling—whether you seek to dwell in Qasr or live at the bottom of the sea, for you have been breath to my spirit as the zephyrs are breath to my body. The heavens may shatter and blossom again if they please, but I shall never forsake you! for I have been yours since the day small Milad came to us in the summer, and so I shall be unto the _shamsal’s_ ending. No hand save this has borne me so swiftly to joy, or calmed the worst of my sorrow—my path shall run beside you for as long as we live and after, for even the sun would be dark to my sight if it did not fall upon you,   _jaanya—_ ”

With that he crowned his beloved’s third finger with the ring he held in his palm, nearly losing his balance on the cushion as the guests broke out into cheers. Haru glanced up into Makoto’s face and saw that his bridegroom was weeping, gazing at the dark-haired prince before him as if he could scarcely believe that the fates had permitted them to meet—that despite the meddlings of chance and misfortune the two had drawn together, careless of all who sought to thwart them as they plighted their troth in Sahrastan with the folk of five kingdoms as witness.

“Cross your wrists, my sons,” smiled Masoto, taking a scarlet ribbon from the pocket of his robe. He laid the strip of satin on the altar and motioned the princes to lower their hands, binding their arms with a lover’s knot as Momo let fly with a shriek and a piercing whistle.

“Let it be written in the annals that a prince has been wedded to our house, flesh of my flesh and blood of my blood until my line is ended,” said the sultan. “I name you both married in the eyes of the Goddess, _radhiya,_ and never again to be sundered through all your days under Heaven.”

The chamber erupted in a storm of applause as Makoto leaned forward and caught his beloved in a kiss, nearly squashing small Milad between them as Haru sprang up and returned the embrace with all his might. As the Qasrian’s arms grew tighter round his waist his bridegroom burst into tears, taking the whole of Makoto’s face between his shaking hands as he kissed it from chin to brow.

“ _Husband_ ,” he sobbed at last, and once Makoto spoke the word for himself their friends heard nothing further for a time—for both of the princes were weeping so that they could scarcely breathe, clasping one another in arms until nearly a third of the guests had gone away to the gardens.

*    *    *

An hour later the whole of the assembly was spread throughout the garden, frolicking here and there as Haru and Makoto roved from corner to corner to greet them. There were of course the foreign dignitaries from Ram-Susah and Tirah Alis, and the Queen Alysheba from Sikandar who had come in her daughter-in-law’s stead. Upon catching sight of Haru walking near the rosebushes and Aki trailing along in his cousin’s wake she took the two princes up in her arms and kissed them until their faces were pink, for though she had not seen them since they were lads they had passed the better part of a year in her care twelve summers before.

“It is joy indeed to see you looking so well, _shin’ainaru-koya_ ,” she said, stepping back to gaze up into his face and then Aki’s. “And the both of you married at last—I can scarcely believe you are the same little children who begged my son to take you riding and quarrelled over the bathtub in your chambers in Sikandar! Where is Rei then, Aki-chan? I saw him running past the lake with that golden-haired dancer of his after the handfasting, but nobody has seen him since.”

“The kitchens, most likely,” said Haru, exchanging a grin with Makoto as Aki burst into laughter. “But they will be out again as soon as Azar lays hold of them, and then I shall send them to see you.”

“Very well,” chuckled the Queen, returning to the jasmine pergola on the central terrace where she had been sitting with Kazumi. Haru and Makoto continued between the flowerbeds with Milad riding quietly on Makoto’s shoulders, peering round at all the folk he saw as if not quite certain what they were doing at the palace at all.

On the eastern face of the _alcazar_ by the kitchen courtyard three of the bridegrooms’ marriage party had made their escape from the gathering, crouching near the storerooms with a basket of stolen apple-tarts. Azar had not so much as noticed their absence, for the moment she spotted Nagisa’s light fingers making away with a skewer of lamb she snatched up a ladle from the wall and took it to the dancer’s backside, driving him out of the kitchens with Rei before retreating to the cellars for a draught of wine. Momo had escaped through the side-door unseen, fleeing softly to the vegetable gardens where Malka and Lili were waiting. The misguided lad had vowed some weeks past to make a necklace of pies and slip it round Makoto’s neck on the wedding-day, and nobody who knew of the plan had any inkling of how in Heaven’s name he had thought of it.

Certainly Momo himself never understood how the plot had come to him, but still he was loath to relinquish it, and so he sat now with Lili and Malka watching them string the tartlets on a loop of sturdy white cotton. As usual the two girls followed his wishes without question, for amusement was vitally dear to them just as it was to Nagisa—and their schemes held no danger at all, for through the past fifteen years and more Seijurou’s wrath had only ever struck home on his brother’s head.

“I shall go to find the pair of them now, then,” announced Malka, rising from the oaken bench and dusting the folds of her gown. “You ought to hide that for as long as you can, Momo—or else hang it round your own neck until we can reach him, for nobody would look at you twice for wearing such a thing.”

With that she waltzed down the steps and vanished into the garden, leaving Momo staring in her wake with a soft warm light in his tawny eyes. Lili saw the glance and snorted through a mouthful of pastry, slapping the boy on his shoulder as he shook his head from side to side like a startled doe.

“You are only seventeen yet, remember,” she laughed, watching in glee as Momo stumbled to his feet. “A year from your coming-of-age, and far too young to speak of your love to anyone.”

“As if I care for that,” breathed the boy, fastening his girdle round his waist. He plucked the wreath of pies from the basket and hung it over his shoulders, taking to his heels as he fled down the path the way his friend had gone.

*    *    *

After luncheon the guests went back to their revelry on the terrace, and having spoken with all the delegates from the provinces Haru and Makoto were free to wander the grounds as they liked. At the second bell the better part of the assembly took to the plinth down the central walk to dance, prancing hither and yon with whatever step they pleased. The newly-wedded pair were foremost among the dancers, and soon the younger prince found himself laughing until he could scarcely breathe, spinning in place with his cheek resting below Makoto’s shoulder. His left hand was pressed to the Qasrian’s lips, and every now and then Makoto turned his mouth to the twin gold rings on Haru’s third finger before whisking him back from the balustrade. As Haru whirled past Ikuya he stifled a sudden grin, for it seemed that his brother-in-arms had found himself thoroughly charmed by a maid from the dancing-troupe. The boy had not so much as looked at Natsuya for the past three hours, gazing instead at the dark-haired lass who had claimed him as her partner for the afternoon.

By and by the warmth in Haru’s limbs grew brighter, and he marveled that he had never known such joy as this in all his years in Iwatobi. Certainly he never once dreamed that he would come to be grateful for that summer—the summer that Sahrastan wilted like a desert blossom, robbed of the nourishing rains that poured life back into the soil. Before traveling to the East he had lived in fear that his heart would be slain by the journey, slain by the fires of drought and offered as a price to calm the whispers of rebellion in Atar Qasr.

And what had come of it all! Nagisa and Rei were dancing across from them, at the opposite end of the dais—leaping about the floor hand-in-hand, the piercing gleams of the amethyst on Rei’s third finger catching the sunbeams as they went. Ran and Hayato were running after one another between the sunlit flowerbeds, the topaz and ruby of their betrothal rings bringing a lump to Haru’s throat whenever his gaze fell upon them. Sakura and Rin, boisterous as ever, had tempted the sultan’s cat into the lotus pool with a bit of fried fish, and were made to flee the place when the hissing creature shot out of the water and sprang at the couple in a fury. Rin earned himself a great scratch on his embroidered shoes for his pains, and as he pelted down the path at Sakura’s heels he wondered how it was that he followed his wife at all she did no matter how foolish it seemed.

Suddenly the princes stopped in their tracks and listened, for over the laughter echoing through the lawns they had heard their own names called—drifting from the southern end of the garden where the temple stood, and so they made their way between the guests and went to see who had summoned them. When they came to the steps before the shrine they saw that Natsuko and Kazumi were sitting together in the shade with a great sheaf of parchment between them, waving at the princes with tender smiles on their faces. Haru glanced swiftly at Makoto and pressed his hand again, tugging him up the stairs to the altar where the handfasting had been held.

“I had nearly forgotten this, but now it shall be done,” laughed Natsuko, pushing a quill and a well of ink across the table toward them. “Haru, my lad, before the feasting is over you must set your name on the papers that name you a son of Qasr and heir to its throne beside Makoto.”

“I had forgotten entirely,” confessed Makoto, watching Haru daub the shaft of the black swan’s feather in the inkpot. “Is my mark needed, then?”

“Of course it is,” said Kazumi, watching as Haru searched the page for the line where she and Tamotsu had laid their seals and signed below it. Makoto’s gaze flickered to the slender hand as the Western characters blossomed beneath it like the greening buds of spring—the first sigil of Haru’s name, and then the second—

“There, it is done,” said Haru, pursing his lips and blowing gently on the parchment to set the ink.

Makoto frowned, glancing back at the page as Haru sat back on his heels. He had not thought to bring his reading spectacles, and his understanding of the Iwatobian language was poor at best—but still he could have sworn that Haru’s name had three characters, two for his last name and one for his first. Brushing away the thought, he looked up to find that his mother was holding out his spectacles upon her upturned palm, her sweet mouth lifted in the softest of smiles.

“Here, my son,” she said, exchanging a gleeful look with Haru as Makoto put the tip of the quill in the inkpot and looked for the corner where his husband had signed his name. It lay near the bottom of the parchment, just as Makoto had seen it upon the betrothal papers—twice at that, first when Haru was promised to Ran and then at his engagement to Makoto himself—on Haru’s weekly letters to Aki, and lastly on the wedding certificate they had sealed earlier that very afternoon. _Haruka—_

Makoto dropped the quill and choked on a sob, pressing his hands to his mouth as if to keep himself from weeping—for there it was, written clear as day in the Iwatobian script and plain even to Makoto’s unpracticed eyes.

_橘 遙_

_Haruka Tachibana._

“Haru-chan?” he gasped, turning to the younger lad with tears already brimming from his eyes.

“Aye, that is my name,” teased Haru, kissing Makoto’s left hand and slipping the quill back into his right. “The quill shall not write yours of its own accord, Makoto, lovely as it is—you will have to do it yourself.”

“You took the name of my house as yours,” whispered Makoto, letting the feather fall from his fingers again.

“It was in our betrothal vows, was it not?” murmured Haru, looking tenderly up into the Qasrian’s eyes. “You promised me all the rights of your name, and I promised you mine. I am crown prince beside you now, and as much a Tachibana as you are.”

Makoto picked up the pen and signed his name below Haru’s with trembling fingers, seizing his beloved’s hands the moment Natsuko took the parchment back again.

“What am I, that I should have been blessed with a heart such as yours?” he asked, blind to the damp eyes of the Queen and Princess as they rose to their feet and made their way down to the gardens.

“Only as warm as the light of the sun, my love,” answered Haru, hard-pressed to keep the smile from his lips as he kissed Makoto’s brow. “Only as dear to me as the earth to a flower, and beautiful as moonbeams dancing upon the sea.”

Makoto laughed, letting Haru lead him down the steps to join the others, who met them by the balustrade overlooking the town. All of them had gathered there, the dearly beloved of both Iwatobi and Qasr, looking happily on the wedded pair with their love for the princes before them shining like gold in their eyes.

“You shall look after my little brother, then?” laughed Aki, clapping Makoto on the shoulder. “I have never ceased to fear that one day he shall melt in his bath like a rusk, or come out as small and wrinkled as a prune.”

Haru scowled and sprang toward his cousin, who caught him in his arms and passed him to Jun. She reached up to tousle his long black hair, for all the world like the sister she had always been to him.

“We shall miss you terribly,” she sighed, looking across to the garden to the spot below the arbor where the children lay tangled in a heap, shrieking with laughter as they tussled over a bowl of candied oranges. Milad and Kashi were running circles about Ren and Ran, hooting at the tops of their lungs as Kashi took Milad’s hands in his and pretended to eat them. “It is indeed a pity that by the time I returned to the palace you and Rei ran off to Qasr to seek husbands of your own.”

“And a son,” cried Aki. “I am still not over the shock of that one, Haru.”

“I cannot grudge his leaving you, I am afraid,” laughed Makoto. “Not when he made me father and then husband within a year of meeting him.”

“Neither can I,” crowed Rin, letting his chin rest upon his wife’s shoulder. “After all, I was too much a fool to know I loved my Sakura, and perhaps I should have gone on scowling at poor Nagisa when they danced together for the rest of my life, if not for Rei.”

“I don’t doubt that,” muttered Sakura, throwing an apologetic glance at the chuckling steward.

“I will be happy here, Aki,” said Haru, embracing his cousin. “I am happy as I have never been—as if I have found a place in Heaven, for there can be no heaven sweeter than this to me.”

“I know, _shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” murmured Aki. “And I shall miss you dearly, but you _must_ spend a month in Sahrastan every year, and no less at least until you are king.”

“That is a strange thought, isn’t it?” asked Nagisa, still arm-in-arm with Rei. “That Haru-chan will be sultan some day?”

“Do not speak of it!” Rei put his face in his hands, gazing out mischievously between his fingers at his friend. “I shall fall to my knees and weep for Qasr at their coronation, for the kingdom’s second sultan will rule the land from his bathtub.”

“Nay, the bathing pools would be better,” said Haru. The mirth bubbled up on his lips like song, and he loosed it fully into the perfumed air as he had grown used to doing of late.

Seijurou let out a shout of laughter, and before long the band grew tired of their jesting—until the evening at least, Rei hoped—and went to join the feasting guests on the terrace.

*    *    *

When darkness fell they gathered again for the dancers’ tribute, sitting on cushions in the grass as Nagisa and the rest fluttered onto the marble plinth like sprites carried down from the stars. To Haru’s astonishment Rei and Rin had taken to the stage beside Nagisa and Sakura, and at last he understood what business the two boys had had with the dancers in Sahrastan. Makoto wrapped small Milad in a shawl and took Haru into his arms, resting his cheek on his bridegroom’s head as the lanterns brightened on the dais.

“What are those two doing, do you think?” murmured Haru, lacing his fingers with Makoto’s and smiling again at the gleam of their broad gold wedding-rings.

“Well, it is plain why Rei is there,” smiled the Qasrian. “In the East the ode of a marriage-dance is one undertaken by those who love the bridegroom most dearly, and so of course Rei would have joined them for love of you.”

“And Rin for you, then?”

“Perhaps,” laughed Makoto, drawing Haru closer still so that his breath came and went across his husband’s white cheek. “But I think he could certainly not have borne to see Sakura dancing with Rei again, and so he must have demanded to take part for her as well as for me.”

Haru snickered into Milad’s dark hair, recalling the day Sakura and Rin plighted their troth in Rei’s little bedroom so long ago. At length he turned his face to the plinth again, for all the gathering had gone silent—and Nagisa was standing before his fellows with Sakura beside him, awaiting the first note from the lutes with his body held firm like a bowstring drawn for the shot.

When the music began he and Sakura sprang up like flowers from their beds, and with the rise and fall of their limbs and shoulders they invoked the slopes of rolling dunes, reflecting with twinkling fingers a sky so thick with stars that the dark turned almost to silver—calling up the thirst of the golden sands with the perilous arch of their spines, mirroring the deadly fear that hung over the West with brows drawn up in anguish—

“Oh, _Nagisa_ ,” whispered Haru, careless of the water coursing down his lashes as Sakura bent to touch the ground at her feet. He and Makoto sat breathless as the events of the past year came to life before their eyes, laughing and crying by turns when Rei and Nagisa joined hands and broke into the _Raqas-Almatar,_ halting their steps by design to imitate Makoto’s uncertainty when he first danced with Haru on the night of the younger prince’s arrival in Qasr.

Then Lili came forth with a silken sash in each hand, gamboling across the dais like a child, Haru thought—scripting her turns so carelessly that he could have sworn they were plotted the moment she made them. She flourished her dancing-ribbons once before turning into Sakura’s arms, and at once Haru knew whom she was meant to be—

“ _Milad,_ ” croaked Makoto, clutching Haru’s shoulders to keep himself upright. The little lad looked up at the sound of his name before turning back to the bit of cake he had taken from the supper-table, blind to his father’s sobbing as Momo and Malka slowed their pace so they might have been moving through water—or throwing their duties aside to go and swim in the bathing-pools, as Makoto and Haru had done so often during the latter’s first season in Sardahan.

Perhaps some power beyond their craft had stolen into the dancers’ limbs that evening, for though they were only performing the memory matched their movements as if the two were one, bringing the princes through summer and winter and spring until they came to summer again—just past the first of Zahr’al-Adar, and then to the month of the marriage-day. At last the minstrels’ voices began to fade, dying one by one as the moon rose up to its height, and then the rest of the gathering joined the troupe on the plinth to dance alongside them like fireflies circling round a pyre.

*    *    *

The revelry lasted late into the night, growing livelier as darkness descended upon the garden. The fireworks were brought out from the storage chambers an hour after sunset: not only the crackers and sparklers that Makoto and Rin had bought for the betrothal ceremony ten months previously, but great Martulian wheels and whistlers wider across than a barrel, fired from the highest levels of the palace to burst in showers of glittering rain and burning flowers above the courtyard.

Milad, having grown tired of playing with the older children, was returned to his fathers’ arms, lying drowsily upon Makoto’s shoulder as he and Haru sat by the parapet and watched the fiery spectacle of the heavens above them. The little lad was nodding swiftly toward slumber, careless of the shrieking whistlers and shells thundering over the balustrade.

“Could you ever have thought it would have ended so?” murmured Haru, letting his head rest beside Milad’s on Makoto’s arm.

“Nay,” chuckled the elder prince. “We met twelve moons ago as brothers-in-law, and you broke your betrothal to my sister to wed me. It is the stuff of legends, that—perhaps they shall tell of our adventures a hundred years hence, even.”

“Rei shall write another play-book about us, I am sure,” answered the Iwatobian, yawning like a cavern as fleet of scarlet horsetails burst into flame nearly over his head.

“I think we ought to go in, Haru,” said Makoto, as his husband’s eyes flickered shut once again. “Milad should have been in his bed long ago, and you are weary yourself.”

“Perhaps you are right,” yawned Haru, turning away from the freworks and making his way across the terrace with Makoto’s arm in his. They bid farewell to their friends as they passed, embracing Aki and Jun and nearly stumbling over Nagisa and Rei, who had fallen asleep on the grass by the pond.

When they reached the palace doors the guards bowed them past with smiles upon their swarthy faces, for Makoto had been well-beloved by all the castle since his childhood, and after Haru’s arrival the soldiers and servants had grown to love him just as dearly. Haru stopped and stared in wonder the moment they halted in the entrance hall, for the place was awash with color—and only dimly lit with lanterns hanging in the window-frames, but still the glow was enough and more to illuminate the patches of green and violet sand that made a path from the threshold up to the staircase. The dust had been poured in the shape of pictures, the Qasrian coat of arms entwined with the Western dragon—stars and moons and planets wheeling beside birds and blossoms, so lovely to look upon that Haru scarcely dared move his feet for fear of spoiling them. At last he plucked at his bridegroom’s sleeve and asked what the _alkara_ was for, receiving a kiss and a peal of laughter in return as Makoto tugged him closer to the steps.

“It is a custom in the East,” said the elder prince, leading Haru up the stairs to the old guest-chamber. “The sand is meant to guide us back to our chambers, for if we had kept with the old ways we should have only learned where our wedded quarters lay after the handfasting.”

They made their way up to the royal wing upon aching feet, sore from hours of dancing the piece that Sakura and Nagisa had scripted for them as a wedding-gift. At last they reached the third level and stopped at the door to Haru’s old chambers, for Makoto had thrown out his arm to keep his beloved from setting his hands on the latch.

“What is it?” asked Haru, looking curiously at the blushing Qasrian.

“Will you wait for a moment?” pleaded Makoto, shifting Milad so that he lay upon the opposite shoulder.

“Certainly, if you wish it,” said Haru. “But why?”

“There is one last thing before we can rest, my love—I will put Milad in his cot, and then return for you.” Having received a puzzled nod from his husband, Makoto vanished into the bedroom and returned a minute later without the baby, who had been tucked beneath the covers in his little crib.

“Shut your eyes, _rouhiya_ ,” whispered the prince, laughing softly as Haru’s black lashes fell swiftly onto his cheek.

Haru stood for an instant in silence before he felt himself lifted into Makoto’s arms. A gasp broke from his lips as he left the floor, and he wound his hands about the Qasrian’s neck as Makoto turned and took a step toward the open door.

“When a man is married in Qasr, his beloved must cross the threshold of their home in his arms,” he murmured. “Hold still, my heart.” And with that Makoto carried Haru into their chambers, shutting the door quietly behind him before lowering the Iwatobian onto a divan in the parlor.

For a moment Haru blinked in the lamplight as if he did not know the room at all, and a minute later he realized that the apartment was changed—not quite wholly, but still greatly enough that he rose from his place to gaze left and right in amazement. Perhaps the fairest alteration was the wide-seated swing that dangled from the beams at the ceiling, bound by four bronze chains strung with golden bells. He set his hand on the ropes and pushed them forward, laughing in delight as a flurry of high sweet notes rang off the marble floor like the best of a minstrel’s music.

“That was Mother’s gift,” said Makoto softly. “What do you think, sweetheart?”

“ _Beautiful_ ,” breathed Haru, turning on his heel to gaze at the oaken bookcase. He had not thought to bring the volumes he loved best from Sahrastan, but it seemed that Rei and Nagisa had thought of it for him—and so the long shelves were filled with tomes in the Western speech and common, each one of them dearly beloved as the palace from whence they had come. He laughed once more as his fingers brushed the spine of an aged book of fairy stories, recalling it clearly as daylight from the by-gone days of his childhood. Aki had read the tales to his small brothers time and again, singing so sweetly of valor and love and gods who descended to walk among men that Rei and Haru almost believed the stories to be true.

Haru slid the old manuscript back into its place before taking Makoto’s hand and going into the bedroom, wondering in silence at the silken melody drifting over the threshold. Once they passed the door he cried out in wonder, for the windows were open to the night—and where once there were only panes of glass in the frames a pair of wooden lattices were set before them, and each cell shining with a single silver bell so that the wind left a trail of music in its wake as it wafted into the chamber.

“Milad will not let us shut the windows at all after this,” he chuckled, yawning from ear to ear as Makoto bent over the cot to kiss their small son goodnight. Having done so, the elder prince went to the cupboard to change his gown for a sleeping-tunic, but Haru put out a hand and stopped him in his tracks before he could open the doors.

“Wait, my love—”

“Aye, the finding of the names,” murmured Makoto, and though they were both still standing by the frame of bells in the window his cheeks flushed rose in the candlelight—as if he knew something that Haru did not, some secret cradled between his hands like a priceless jewel to be cherished. Together they backed away from the rustling curtains and withdrew to the foot of the bed, sitting nearly face to face at the end of the bolster as green eyes gazed into blue. This last was the final duty to be finished before they could sleep, the search for one another’s names in the _lauha_ as the custom was in Iwatobi and Sikandar.

“You may look for yours, if you wish it,” said Haru, letting his lashes drift down to his cheek as Makoto bent to kiss him before lifting his sparkling trousers up to the curve of his knee. The elder prince folded them back to keep the dark silk from slipping, brushing the sides of Haru’s feet with a gentle finger as he searched the fine-drawn flowers for his own fair name in the ink. A steady warmth stole into Haruka’s body at the sight of him kneeling there, with one foot glowing like a pearl in his lap before it was joined by the other.

“Not here, I think,” smiled the Qasrian, his eyes growing soft as his glance caught a floating lily by Haru’s ankle. The lotus was the only blossom which Haru had seen fit to color, tinting its fluted petals so that it matched the sapphires of his wedding ring. “Will you give me your hands, my love?”

“With all my heart,” came the whisper, followed by Haru’s smooth hands as they pushed back their trailing sleeves and set themselves in Makoto’s. Ten minutes more passed by as the painted eagles and willows’ leaves grew damp with the prince’s tears, but still he could not find the sigils he sought in the _lauha_ —and he had looked at each shape so closely that Haru’s ears were redder than summer carnations, growing darker by the second as Makoto lifted his head to face him.

“I would have known if I saw them, _jaanya_ ,” he said. “And so I must not have seen them at all, my darling—is it not so?” He caught the left hand fast in his and drew it up to his chin, setting his nose by the wide gold band that glittered on Haru’s third finger.

“It lies there, does it not?”

“It does,” breathed Haru, repeating their marriage-oath anew as he took Makoto into his embrace. His eyes grew dim as he saw that the Qasrian’s forearms were covered with sleeping dragons, lying across his light-brown skin with their heads near his elbow and their tails snaking up to his shoulders. Haru wondered perhaps if Makoto had chosen to conceal his name in the glinting scales, but try as he might he could not find the three glyphs that composed it—or even the word in the Eastern script, though the beast’s golden mail was poorly fit to disguise it.

He searched the paint below Makoto’s knees and found nothing at all save the Qasrian seal and Makoto’s coat of arms entwined with his own to make up their wedded sigil. Once he had finished with both of his husband’s long-toed feet he saw that Makoto was blushing thrice as hard as he did when he carried his beloved into their chambers earlier in the evening—and again Haru knew that the prince beside him had kept back some precious truth, scarcely daring to reveal it even now that the hour had come.

Haru’s pale hands drifted up to the neck of Makoto’s gown, asking his leave with a tender look to undo the buttons at his collar. One by one the emerald clasps were split from their hooks, seeming almost to sigh at their parting as the robe slipped down to the mattress. The wedded pair made quick work of the cotton chemise beneath, untying the laces and casting it aside as Makoto’s wide shoulders were bared to the crimson lamplight. Haru blinked twice and twice again at the spectacle shimmering before him, choking on a strangled sob as his fingers touched Makoto’s breastbone almost of their own accord.

There on the Qasrian’s chest was a flower-garden in full bloom, as perfect a match for Haru’s wedding clothes as the oceans were to the skies. An elder tree stretched from Makoto’s left hip to the dragon’s tail on his shoulder, and a bubbling spring poured forth from its roots and wove through the painted grass to lie in a mirrored pool four inches beneath the last of the prince’s ribs. The lake was alight with pearly silver, but even below the precious dust the skin flashed white like a cluster of fireflies—for long ago a lance’s head had torn through the spot without mercy, and the rippling mark it left in its wake had gone wholly untouched by the seasons that followed.

Beside the scar some skillful hand—surely Natsuko’s, Haru thought—had drawn a bed of pink roses filling the air with their perfume, and a wealth of lacewing butterflies were gathered on the leaves to drink their nectar. There was even a fleet of drifting clouds gathered together as Haru had never seen them before, lying above the uppermost boughs of the elder like a veil of fine-woven linen.

And at last he knew what Makoto had meant by the deed, breaking like glass at the weight of it as their lips met again like lodestones—drawn to embrace as if neither of the two had the power to resist, stopping only for a moment as the Qasrian lifted his head and spoke the meaning of the _lauha_ aloud.

“The springtime, Haru,” he whispered. “Oh, sweetheart, your _name_ —fair as the blossoms of Zahr’al-Adar, and _you_ —”

“Hush, my love,” gasped the younger prince, “What have I done—oh, Goddess—what have I _been,_ that one such as you should hold me so dear!”

He asked for no reply, and yet a reply was given to him—for the gift of Makoto’s own being surrendered in the dust at his feet, fallen before him like the folds of his deep-blue gown as it slipped off his shoulders to the floor. They knew nothing more of the merrymaking on the terrace below after that, and even less of the firecrackers as they shattered the night overhead. All the world was lost to the princes save each other, but perhaps it had always been so…and perhaps they had always known it, from the very day they first met in the palace gardens so many months before.

But it was wonder to them both that Haru nearly wept at his husband’s laughter, that no hand but Makoto's had the grace to lift him from sorrow, that the light in his tender eyes would be for ever smothered if his darling was lost to him. To them it seemed as if a moonbeam, having fallen from Heaven with her kin, had come to rest in the upturned palm of a child—and rather than slipping from rosy fingers lay pooled like a stream aglow with starlight, passing her flame imperishable like a boon into mortal keeping.

And no less of a marvel was Haru's undying love, for Makoto belonged to the prince in his arms as rays belonged to the sun, so far beyond fear and question that doubt never claimed him at all—but the answering cry within Haruka's breast was a rainstorm sung forth into life, a god's own bliss at the humble oath with which his bridegroom had blessed him.

It was thus that they came to the brink of the ether that night, hovering between their world and the next like the vaults between earth and sky. By the hour the gong belowstairs struck midnight their sight was forever changed, as if the whole of Makoto’s lifeblood had flowed into Haru’s white limbs—and returned to the Qasrian’s lungs replenished, glistening with silver and moonstones and gold where they flourished in Haruka’s heart. At long last they lay touching at hip and shoulder without so much as a hairsbreadth to part them, so that when Haru’s black lashes curled up in the darkness they caught on a sparkling droplet slanting down from above—trickling gently from cheek to cheek like a promise, a vow sung sweetly into his throat as Makoto’s eyes flew open like lanterns unveiled to the evening. At the sight his husband was stunned beyond speech, staring up into the two twin jewels that were emerald green of old—fair and sound like young leaves in the Spring, and now wide and wet and _blue—_

“Makoto,” he breathed, lifting his hands to lay them on Makoto’s cheek before the words went still on his tongue. But by some dear enchantment of souls tied fast together they found that Haru’s thought had gained passage into Makoto’s own mind, and its trembling reply was given like a troth as the prince turned his mouth to the alabaster thumb and kissed it with lips that shook at the touch, moving from knuckle to wrist to palm with all the devotion of a prayer.

The panelled oil-lamp on the nightstand flared up in a draught of wind, and by its red light Haru saw himself in his treasure reflected—for the hues of cobalt and indigo did not fade from Makoto’s face while Haru lay there beside him, burning bright and fair as the day as the cloak of the night grew deeper like a silken blanket in the shadows.

At length their sweet kisses gave up their power, slowing their pace as the inky skies turned yellow with the waxing dawn. The West slumbered on in a shroud of mist, clinging fast to the spell of the marriage-day as it passed like a song into memory—and when Haru’s eyelids fell shut on the gilded chamber they closed on the bow of Makoto’s smile, robbed of its vigor by the might of the joy they had learned that night in their halls. And so they sank into sleep together, newly transformed into spirits greater than either had hoped to become alone—hand in hand beneath the high-arched ceiling, lost to the shades of their shining dreams as light swelled up through the heavens like waves brimming forth from the sea.

  
  



	20. On the Shores of the Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Haru and Makoto go on their wedding trip, and Haru makes a promise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating on time? I...I don't know her.  
> I AM SO SORRY FOR TAKING SO LONG. But here we are at last, the final chapter of Slain by Fire, Sped by Flame.

Haru opened his eyes upon a dizzying wealth of gold, for the sun had awoken to glitter where it struck the floor like a traveler kneeling before a desert pool. He wondered if the chamber had always been so fair, or if it was only that he had never risen so early without Rei dragging him bodily from the bed—for the apartment seemed to have been made lovely anew, and as he remembered the treasures of the previous day he curled into the blankets with laughter brimming on his lips. The hem of an embroidered collar fluttered by his cheek, and as he lay bound in his husband’s embrace he felt a wave of glee beginning at his feet and mounting to his heart, where it swelled until Haru was sure it must have touched Makoto’s own. 

He found that amidst the depths of his joy he could keep still no longer, and unraveling his limbs from Makoto’s he pushed himself upright before stooping to kiss the elder prince’s brow. A smile lifted the tender mouth even as its keeper slumbered on below the quilt, and after pressing the hand that wore the emerald ring, Haru slipped from beneath the covers and rose lithely from the bed. There was no heaviness in his fluid body, despite the feasting and dancing that had lasted late into the night, and taking to his heels Haru ran lightly across the room to stand before the looking-glass at the opposite end of the chamber. 

It seemed too far-fetched to be truth, that his wedding day had wrought such a change in him, but as he gazed at his reflection he saw that not the slightest trace of care and sorrow remained, and that he was once more as he had been so long ago that only his elders recalled it—in the years before the rebellion in his boyhood, before his grandmother’s death and his uncle’s coronation. But he was richer by far than the child of bygone days, for while that little boy had held the love of father and mother and brothers, he had never possessed the heart of a soft-spoken lad with the warmth of the morning in his eyes, and the latter was the sweetest gift that Haru had known in all his days. 

Turning away from the glass, he went swiftly to the cot by the bed and saw that Milad still lay sleeping, with Ren’s beloved doll cradled to his chest as he dreamed. It seemed as if the palace itself lay dreaming below the dawn, but still a half-forgotten strain of song seemed to beckon to him as he stood in the silent chamber. He followed it to the cupboard, and flung open the armoire to see Jun’s wedding gift—no costly present of silks and jewels, but a simple canvas stretched over a frame of fragrant sandalwood. Haru took it into his arms, and at the touch of the lath upon his fingers he sped away to sit by the door to the washroom, gathering his brushes and paints as he went. He set the canvas on its stand, and almost of its own will his hand darted back and forth across the cloth, mirroring his heart with all the skill of the glass hanging on the eastern wall. Before he knew it, the cloth was awash in crimson and gold for the heavy tapestries, cream for the hue of the gleaming tiles and amber for the teak of the carven bed—white for the ivory drapes and scarlet for the eiderdown, and blue for the sleeves of Makoto’s tunic as he lay between the tangled sheets. 

By and by the portrait took shape like a flower in the sunlight, spilling from beneath his fingers without so much as a thought to govern it. He could not have told from whence the swiftness came, but at last all was finished but for Makoto’s face. Haru had begun lining the feathery brows when a sigh arose from the blankets, and touched by the same joy that had woken the younger prince Makoto lifted his lashes to meet his husband’s gaze as he sat by the easel. 

“Lie back, my love,” said Haru, dipping his brush in a well of forest green. “Do not stir, or this shall be spoilt.”

“Already at your craft,  _ amarya? _ ” murmured Makoto, smiling into Haru’s pillow. “When did you leave my side?”

“Hardly an hour ago,” answered his bridegroom, pouring a drop of gilt into the well of his mixing-plate. He ran the blade twice through the dab of paint, and when he raised his brush to the portrait again he saw that the gold brought the tender gleam of the Qasrian’s eyes to life as if Makoto himself looked out from the canvas, with the boundless beauty of his slumbering face mirrored in color and cloth like light on a pool. Haru took up the knife again, and not five minutes later he stood back from the painting and saw his dearest treasure as he was, as he would always be—

Makoto threw back the covers and slid to the floor, crossing the icy tile to stand by Haru on the hearthrug. He wrapped an arm about the prince’s waist and drew him close to his side, and they stood together as they looked at the picture, Haru with tears brimming from his eyes and Makoto with breathless awe shining in his own. 

“How is it that you see me thus?” he whispered. No artist of the court could have done such work, and Makoto knew it as surely as daylight. 

“I see you as you are, my heart,” breathed Haru. “As you have always been—”

The brushes fell clattering to the floor as he lifted his face to Makoto’s, staining the tiles with red and white as Haru set his hands on Makoto’s shoulders and stood on pointed toes to kiss him. The Qasrian returned the embrace with all his might and laughed before drawing his bridegroom back to the bed, tugging the blankets up to their chins as he set his cheek against Haru’s dark hair. 

“You cannot still be weary,  _ jaanya _ ,” teased Haru, permitting Makoto to pull him closer still as the elder prince shut his eyes. But still they fell back to their dreams before long, for they had not slept until dawn, and though the sweet strength of the night before still lingered in their blood its thrall was all but spent. So it was that they slumbered on until noon, and though they did not emerge from their chambers until long past their usual supper-hour not a soul came forth to their doors to rouse them. Haru passed the better part of the day between his silken blankets, lying against the cushions with his head on Makoto’s arm. Milad sat between them as he had long since grown used to doing, playing with his dolls in the stillness as his parents lay bound by their joy on either hand. Neither of the lads thought to say anything at all, passing their thought from one to the other with the touch of their calloused palms—except when small Milad demanded his food, whereupon they laughed and took him out to the parlor to eat his fill of fragrant bread and stew. For themselves they could not eat, caught in their love-looks and kisses as they were, and it was nearly dark before they broke their fast with a great dish of sweets that Nagisa and Rei had smuggled up from the kitchens. 

When they rested again the visions they met were kindly ones, and not so much as a single shadow touched Makoto’s heart as they slept. It seemed to him that the vale where they dwelled had been left behind at last, thrown away to the mists until it saw fit to open before them again; for open it would, and not even the dreams of a man newly-married had the strength to keep it at bay. But amid the songs that wove through his slumber he found himself standing on a stretch of white sand before a plain of water that shone in the ruddy light like a looking-glass by a flame, on a shore he had known from his childhood and feared for just as long. At his knee he felt two little arms clutching at his trousers for dear life, and in his right hand the warmth of long fingers lying against his palm. In his youth he could not think of the Bahrayn without recalling the storm that had altered his sight for ever, but as he looked on it then he found it was wholly changed: beautiful as the day where once it was only a thing of grief, and somehow a treasured gift to his darling standing beside him. 

*         *         *

Haru was crowned three days after the wedding, naming him prince of Qasr and heir to its throne beside Makoto. The ceremony was only a simple one, for the better part of the guests had taken their leave from the palace—all save the delegation from Iwatobi, for none of the royal house could have borne to miss the coronation. It was there, too, that Haru surrendered the coat of arms he had worn from the day of his naming-feast: an indigo blossom wreathed round the curve of a dragon’s claw, marking him both as Aki’s brother and Tamotsu’s only child. Throughout his life the sigil had rested in state on his right first finger, but now it shone two places back on the third, while the broad gold shield of his married crest glinted like fire by his thumb.

Once Haru was given the silver diadem meant for the first heir’s consort, Milad received his father’s name for his own, and the youngest prince of Sardahan came under its colors at last. They fit him well, Haru thought, for Milad was born for the kindly breath of the East—joyous and fair as a bud in his beauty, and fresh as the blooms of the bergamot trees that grew in the palace courtyard.

“ _ Milad Tachibana _ ,” said Ren at luncheon, rolling the words with his small red tongue as if to taste them fully. “Isn’t it a pretty name,  _ nii-chan? _ ”

“Aye, the fairest,” smiled Makoto. At the soft lilt of Haru’s laughter he reached beneath the table and caught at his bridegroom’s left hand, grasping it tightly as Milad poked his nose into Rei’s wine-goblet. 

“Nay, not yet,” said the steward, pushing the glass to the opposite side of his plate. “It will be thirteen years before you are old enough to touch that,  _ radhiy _ .”

“Give him to me,” chuckled Haru, taking the baby into his own lap to feed him a bit of stewed chicken. Milad relinquished the glass without protest, clutching gleefully at his  _ aita’s  _ hands as he took the spoon between his small white teeth. 

When the meal was over and the dishes cleared the party split up again, for Makoto, Sei and Rin had been called to attend a meeting the sultan’s study, and the moment their brother was gone the little ones fled to play in the gardens with Kashi. Aki and Haru made their way between the tended paths to sit by the lake with Rei and Nagisa, but before long the younger two grew weary of the heat and tramped off to raid the kitchens. Once they were gone the princes rose from the rough-hewn bench and went back into the  _ alcazar _ , wandering the sunlit halls in silence as they waited for the cool of evening. 

“It does look well,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ ,” said Aki, as they sat together by the bathing pools later that afternoon. He took his cousin’s hand in his and stared at the three bright seals, lingering longest on the brothers’ ring that was forged for Haru’s first birthday. It seemed that the cherished trinket brought some new vigor to his limbs, but when Aki looked down at the opposite palm he dropped his broad shoulders and sighed. 

“Aye, I know,” breathed Haru, curling his fingers together. Although he had kept his birth-sigil he no longer wore the emblem of the Nanase clan, for that had been replaced by the royal crest of Sardahan: a half-blown fig before a ground of willows, mirrored both on Haru’s new blazon and Makoto’s. The Eastern seal was dear to him, certainly, for Qasr was the land Makoto called home, where Ran and Ren and small Milad had entered into his life—and where Haru himself had been altered so greatly, relieved of his childhood sorrow for a while as if it had never touched him. But the prince had given the whole of his heart to the West, to guard its folk from within in the Queen Suhaila’s stead—to honor the woman he remembered only as grandmother, but who walked in her time at the head of the Western army, ruling the greatest realm of the  _ sahra _ without husband or siblings to aid her. And how the empress had perished! slaughtered by knaves as her city went up in flames, guarding her grandsons from ruin with the last dying strength in her body and in that moment commanding them to take up her place as warden, fixing all three with an iron gaze that shone in the dark like fire. 

“She would have driven you to the East if you had not gone from our halls,” said Aki at last, for his brother’s bleak thoughts were plain to his sight like writing laid forth on a page. “She married a minstrel,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ , and braved the wrath of the court to do it, for he could not stand beside her as king and she had no kin in his place.”

“But I have forsaken—”

“Nay, you have not,” murmured the elder prince. “You sought to be wed to your heart’s dearest treasure, and she would have done the same. And I am left to the West, am I not? Have you no faith in me?” At this last he snorted and elbowed Haru’s side, smirking like a cat as his cousin yelped and wriggled out of his reach.

“There is no greater faith among men than mine for you, my brother,” laughed Haru at last, feeling himself made light again at the resolve in Aki’s face. He put up a hand beneath his collar and drew out his wedding-necklace, grinning from ear to ear as Aki leaned forward to examine it. This last trinket bore Makoto’s blazon on a shield, with the royal emblem of Sahrastan dangling close beside it; certainly Haru could never have relinquished the thing completely, and so his old sigil hung close to his heart and warm in the heat of his flesh.

“Does Makoto wear your sign, then?” asked Aki curiously, poking at the chain as it swung from Haru’s fist. 

“Aye, he does,” answered Haru. “It is only a custom in Qasr, I think, but already I hate to part from it when I take off my jewels to sleep.”

“You would,” teased his cousin. He turned and wriggled out of his tunic, rolling headlong into the water as Haru swept back his robes from the damp. They passed the next hour in companionable silence, with Aki swimming lengths across the pool and Haru sitting cross-legged on the tiles to watch him. Between his fingers the thick gold chain glittered like the coils of a serpent, and against his lips Makoto’s blazon sparked and shone in the light rising back from the water. The necklace had rested round his throat only since his wedding-day, but already he cherished its weight like Makoto’s touch on his hand.

As Aki climbed up to the tiles to jump a second time the door burst open again, admitting Makoto and Rei and all the rest behind them. They spent the rest of the afternoon in the long low chamber together, one by one casting off their robes and joining the princes to frolic like children in the water. When Haru found himself caught in a wrestling match with Rin and Momo he threw back his head and laughed, wriggling beneath the surface and darting away like a seal to Milad and Makoto. The baby was paddling in circles round his father, squeaking at the top of his voice whenever Makoto dared put out a hand to steady him. 

“He is more like a goldfish than I thought,” laughed Haru, recalling Milad as he was nearly twelve months before when he first came to live at the palace, sitting cheerily in a kettle for his bath as Makoto passed a sea-sponge over his silken hair. “Who taught you to swim,  _ radhiy? _ ”

“Rei-chan,” said Milad solemnly, splashing back and forth to keep himself upright. Nagisa whooped and took the child on his back, bounding off to the spot where Rei was standing with Kashi perched on the ledge behind him. 

“Put him  _ down,  _ Nagisa!” yelped Rei, twitching like a worm as Nagisa put out a finger and prodded the small of his back. “ _ Rouhiya— _ ”

Makoto laughed in their wake and reached for Haru’s cool hand, clutching it fast like a lifeline as if he wished to speak...but as ever he had no need of it, for Haru stepped closer and laid his head on the sunbrowned shoulder before settling his palms against Makoto’s back. Though the shouting of their friends came back to them clearly they heard nothing but Milad’s sweet voice when it rose above the others, and so they stayed still and quiet as a pair of graven figures until Makoto’s lips settled on Haru’s forehead. 

“ _ Shukraan,  _ my love,” he said, speaking again in that queer soft way he kept for Haru alone, as if his breath had been plucked from the cage of his ribs and passed like a jewel into Haru’s hands without a thought of repayment. 

“ _Ai’bhurniya, shin’ainaru-ko_ ,” replied the other, taking the gift with a kiss on his brow and his arms round Makoto’s waist. “ With all my heart.”

*         *         *

When Zahr’al-Adar drew to an end the Iwatobians took their leave from Qasr, bidding farewell to Rei and Haru with tears enough to water the palace gardens. Even small Milad cried until he was hoarse when Malka coaxed him from Aki’s shoulders, and for a moment it seemed that the sound of the baby’s wails would send the good uncle sobbing again. At last Nagisa managed to quiet him, and amidst his choking snuffles Aki let go of Makoto and turned again to Haru. 

“May the Goddess keep you until we meet again, Lord Tachibana,” said he said, taking his cousin’s hands and clasping them over his heart. By law there was no difference between them now, for while Aki was heir to Sahrastan Haru was heir to Qasr: both crown princes in their right, and slaves to the burden of kingship though neither would sit on a throne for more than twenty years to come. 

“And you, Lord Nanase,” said Haru, whose very heart was weeping at the thought of leaving him so—alone where two brothers were meant to haunt his footsteps, and as the princes embraced again before snatching Rei from Nagisa’s side they prayed as perhaps they had little occasion to pray in all their years, hoping that they would meet again before many months had passed. Once the three boys could be persuaded to part Tamotsu and Kazumi fell on Haru’s neck, kissing his face from brow to chin before giving Hiromasa and Kaguya their turn. 

“Now me,” clamored Kashi, jumping into Haru’s arms the moment his uncle released him. The little lad nuzzled into Haru’s soft tunic just as he had done when he was child scarcely old enough to open his eyes, and every day since until Haru and Rei left the West for Qasr the summer before. “You won’t forget me, will you, Haru-chan?”

“Never, as I live and breathe,” vowed the prince, seizing the lad and smothering him in kisses until he laughed and ran away to the safety of his sister’s arms. It was nearly half an hour longer before the company clambered up into their saddles and rode down the path leading to the square, and as Haru gazed at his cousin’s back it struck him anew that he would not see him for another year at least—a year in which either might be changed beyond measure, for the last twelve moons had been proof enough of that for Haru himself. The guardsmen did not close the gates after Aki and the rest had gone, and so when he turned at the foot of the hill and waved he saw Haru standing between Makoto and Rin, white and somber like a soul bereaved until he mustered the strength to smile and answer his cousin in kind, and having looked one last time upon his face and Rei’s Aki turned and made his way through the streets and out to the sands alone. 

But though he felt himself utterly broken it was never his fate to remain so, for as he departed his brother’s kingdom a peal of lilting laughter rang out through the stillness beside him, and the heart of his cheerful wife was as warm and bright as the sun. He set his chin upon Jun’s shoulder and wrapped his arms about her waist, thanking Heaven that he had had been given the good fortune to know her. Though it seemed he had left a half of himself behind there was nothing dearer to him than she, and as they drew closer to Sahrastan it seemed that his love grew deeper by the day. Neither was she all that was left to him, if he had but known it, for before the year was out the folk of Iwatobi were to dance through the night in the marketplace to herald the birth of a princess with hair as dark as a cowbird’s wing and eyes as blue as Heaven. 

“Farewell, then, _shin’ainaru-koya,_ ” he murmured, turning to the East as he lay half-dreaming in his tent that night with Jun asleep on his arm. “Until we meet again.”

*         *         *

On the morning after Aki’s departure from Qasr Haru was shaken from slumber at dawn, blinking drowsily in Makoto’s embrace as he lifted his cheek to his bridegroom’s. He would not have woken under his own power until at least the seventh bell, and so despite Makoto’s urging he tugged up the crimson blanket and burrowed back under his pillows. 

“Come, my heart,” sang the lilting voice, followed by an arm thrown over his waist as Makoto peered beneath the covers. “The caravan is due to leave at noon, and we must be washed and dressed before Nagisa comes to fetch us.”

“ _ Must _ we go on a wedding tour?” grumbled Haru, putting a cushion over his face. “I do not think I can bear a week of traveling with Rin with nowhere to turn if he loses his temper.”  

“We shall have Sakura to keep him from losing his wits, sweetheart,” Makoto reminded him. “I recall the far East well enough, and its beauty is a marvel indeed—when I first set foot in Martulah I thought I had strayed into Heaven, and still its very soil would weep if one so fair as you saw fit to keep away.”

“Very well, then,” smiled the younger prince, setting a hand to his husband’s chin. Makoto laughed and kissed his snow-white forehead, pressing his brow to Haru’s dark head and shutting his eyes until Milad’s little voice piped up from the quilts between them. 

“Hungry,” he announced, looking this way and that for his breakfast until the two boys bundled him out of his nightgown and into a set of travelling-clothes. Once the child had been fed they had their own breakfasts in the parlor, unlacing their packs after the meal was finished to put in Milad’s toy robin. There were five great satchels in all, two apiece for the princes and one for their little son, each embroidered by the mouth with silver Qasrian glyphs for a label. Both Haru’s pack and Milad’s bore their new blazons on the sacking, and as Makoto knotted the strings on his husband’s bag he touched the lines of Haru’s married name with a queer soft look in his eyes.

“What is it,  _ amarya? _ ” asked Haru, passing by the sketching-table with Milad’s poppet in his arms. Milad himself was toddling at Haru’s heels, clutching the hem of his father’s long tunic as he flew from room to room. 

“Your name, my love.” murmured Makoto. “I had not seen in the Eastern script before, only in the Western speech.”

“ _ Haruka Tachibana? _ ” came the reply, borne by a cloud of breathless laughter as Haru tossed a stack of trousers onto the divan. “What of it?”

“Nothing,  _ jaanya,  _ only—” 

“Aye, I know,” chuckled the younger lad, folding a cotton chemise and dropping it into Makoto’s open hands before kissing the top of his head. “But you must dress at once, or we shall keep the others waiting.” 

The young man fell to his packing with renewed vigor, and so two hours later they found themselves passing the east gate of the city, departing the streets of Sardahan and falling into line on a dusty road perhaps two fathoms across. Haru and Makoto sat astride the same she-camel, while Milad sat tied to Haru’s chest as he did on the journey from Iwatobi. Makoto’s arms were clasped round Haru’s waist, and as the hedgerows slipped past he set his chin upon Haru’s shoulder and shut his green eyes with a smile. 

“ _ Oi! _ ” called Rin, who was riding beside Sakura. “We have been abroad for scarcely ten minutes, Makoto—how will you reach Martulah if you keep on so?”

“Just as I am doing,” called Makoto, giddy as a child as he pulled his husband closer. “And I shall not listen to a word from you about it.”

The advisor sighed at the top of his lungs, turning his eyes to the path as the caravan journeyed on. Though the morning was warmer than usual for Subat they made good time, for that day the party was to cross the plain between Sardahan and the city of Astara, where they were to lodge with the viceroy before changing their camels for horse-drawn carriages and setting their course for Haifa. 

“I have never seen a carriage,” remarked Haru when they stopped for supper at sunset. Though Rin stopped short to stare at his back Makoto knew he spoke truly, for the marble streets of Sahrastan were often blanketed in dust so that nothing heavier than a chariot could go through the place without sinking. “Are they better to ride upon than camels, Makoto?”

“Aye, if the roads are smooth enough,” said his bridegroom. “I have not been in one myself since I was a child of eight, and perhaps they have grown worse since then.”

“It is our duty to see that nothing is amiss in the city, is it not?” mused the younger lad. “What—”

A moment later he wholly forgot what he had wished to say, for a shriek rang out from the tent to their left and drowned out his voice completely, echoing into the spangled night as Rin snatched up a blanket and sprang to his feet,  _ beating _ his pack with all his might as it rocked back and forth in the sand. Haru jumped into Makoto’s lap, snatching small Milad into his arms as the bundle shook and burst open. Makoto shouted and reached for the hilt of his saber, stopping dead in his tracks when a head of bright hair popped out of the mouth of the bag, crowned with a grin so broad that Rin threw down his quilt in the dust and screeched at the top of his lungs. 

“ _ Momo!”  _ he bellowed, snatching the blanket up again and bringing it down on the dancer’s laughing face. “What in the  _ Goddess’s  _ name are you doing here?”

“Keeping you company, nii-chan,” sang the lad, worming his way from the pack. Though he must have lain in the bag for six hours at least he did not seem weary in the least, and at the sight of him Makoto groaned and put his face in his hands. 

“Momo, for the love of Heaven,” he sighed, parting his lips for a scolding before yelping like a cat and seizing his husband’s shoulders. To his right the largest of Sakura’s packs wriggled like a nest of snakes, parting from its clasps a moment later to reveal a wreath of chestnut braids and a pair of dark-brown eyes. 

So it was that where six had set out eight continued the journey, for all the company save the two princes and Rin had been party to Momo’s scheme; it was Rei who had been the dancer’s greatest aid, arranging for Momo’s place with Malka atop the baggage-camel with the lightest load and fitting a broad leather saddle beneath them. The grave-eyed steward of bygone days would never have thought of such a thing, Haru knew, and as a peal of mirth rang out from his brother’s steed he smiled at the thought that Rei’s joy was owed to one man alone—to Nagisa, who had woken the youth stolen from his beloved long ago and returned it to him a hundredfold. 

*         *         *

On the second evening (after close to half a day of Rin and Momo’s shrieking) they reached the province of Astara, which was the closest state to Sardahan save a small city lying between them that claimed no viceroy at all. The governing  _ iyaaf  _ was a lady perhaps two or three years further than forty, and the moment he alighted from the carriage Haru recognized her as the kindly matron who had spoken to him at the champions’ banquet in the first week of Kanun al-Adar. 

“ _ Shukraanya merazi, iyaafa, _ ” he said, meeting her smiling face with a bow in the Qasrian fashion. “I pray our presence gives you no trouble tonight, Lady Soraya, and that if it should you will permit me to atone for our foolishness.”

“There will be none of that,  _ shazada _ ,” laughed Soraya, asking his leave with a glance to kiss Milad’s little hand. The baby eyed her with interest from his perch in Makoto’s arms, cooing like a sleepy dove when her lips brushed his rose-leaf skin. “I will mourn that I had to forgo your marriage until my dying day, for when I came to your city in the autumn it was plain to nearly half the women in Sardahan that prince Makoto loved you with all his heart.”

“From the tournament, then,  _ jaanya? _ ” teased Haru, setting a hand on Makoto’s elbow. He flushed and hid his face in Haru’s dark hair, sighing like a gale as a manservant came forth to lead them into the manor. 

The Sardahanians did not dine with the household that night, for the tenth bell had already gone and left the white city sleeping. There were three sets of chambers ready for them in the northern wing, as the  _ iyaaf  _ had said in her letter, and to Rin’s despair his brother-in-law was made to share his quarters with Malka. Rin and Momo were left to make their beds on the two long divans in the parlor, whilst the ladies retreated to the inner room to sleep away from the men. 

“Shall it be like this until we go back to the palace, then?” grumbled Rin, kicking crossly at the blankets while Momo giggled into his pillows. Haru snorted from the door before plucking Milad up in his arms and withdrawing to his own room, where Makoto had already dressed himself for sleep. By the time he cast off his own long tunic and pulled on a nightshirt Milad had sunk into byelow, curled in a bundle near Makoto’s chest with one hand stretched out for Haru’s. 

“ _ Ahlam jamila,  _ my love,” smiled Makoto, bending over the baby’s head to kiss his bridegroom’s cheek. “We will be up before dawn with the others,  _ rouhiy, _ so you must rest while you can.”

It was the custom in Qasr for newly-wedded princes to travel the kingdom for a time after their marriages, and join in the provinces’ labors alongside the farmers and fishermen who kept breath in the bodies of men from Martulah in the East to the furthest reaches of Iwatobi in the West. That day they had ridden in an open carriage after leaving the old ones with a merchant in Saydar, and Haru had been struck nearly dumb by the sight of short grass giving way to fields as green as emeralds, from which fruits of all shapes and sorts shone forth from the leaves like gems. He laughed again into Milad’s black hair at the thought of it, and sped to his dreams by the lingering weariness of a long day spent in the saddle he shut his dark eyes and slept. 

Though they had not rested for long they were made to get up before sunrise, and once they were washed and dressed they went out into the surrounding honey fields to begin the summer’s harvesting. The princes were clad from head to foot in white muslin gowns to ward their skins from the sun, and even small Milad was bundled up like a parcel, for though Haru was loath to bring him close to the hives the baby had wailed himself hoarse when his parents made to leave him behind. Now he was riding on Makoto’s shoulders, clinging fast to his bonneted veil as Haru knelt down to spread a soft mat on the grass. 

“Sit here, sweetheart, and do not stir a muscle,” he instructed, taking Milad into his arms before setting him down on the mat. Milad furrowed his little brow and glared, but when he saw that Makoto had moved only ten paces away he sat content and watched the two princes at work. It was easier labor than Haru had feared, for though the bees flew thick and fast they never once made to sting their keepers, and though the fruits of their labor were taken before their eyes they paid it no mind at all. The slats came forth dripping with gold, so heavy with the wealth of their harvest that even Makoto could scarcely lift them as he carried them back and forth. By and by the three farmers stripped the hives of their bounty, moving further down the pasture as they crossed from box to box. Haru and Makoto went slowly in their wake, handling the bees with breathless caution before shutting the open crates. Now and then they glanced back to look for Milad, frightened lest the child should grow tired of watching the beetles running round his feet and get up to catch them—but though they had spent an hour at least in the field Milad had scarcely moved, sitting quiet and still as a mouse amongst the purple wildflowers. From where Haru knelt by the hives the baby looked like nothing more than a lump of sugar in the grass, kicking his feet in their tiny socks as he blinked against the sun.

"Look at him," he breathed, leaning up on tiptoe to whisper in Makoto's ear. "Look at the darling—see how well he minds, my love! I told him to sit in the grass so he would not fret the bees, and there he is watching us both without stirring a limb to follow!"

As the morning wore on their labor grew slow and heavy, and at first Haru could not believe it—for he had spent nearly all his life in the practice ring from the month he first learned to read, training his slender body until his white hands and feet were weapons as deadly and fierce as the saber he bore at his waist. But never before had he risen and fallen perhaps two hundred times in the span of a single hour, lifting the frames and setting them down before bending back to the hives until his back protested as if at a day’s worth of sparring. Makoto fared no better, for once the first plot was finished he put his hands and knees and panted as he did after jousting. 

They finished their work amidst a chorus of gossip and laughter from the others, joining in the gaiety when they grew sure enough to turn their eyes away from the bees for a moment. By and by the pails filled up with honey, sweet and golden like a hill by daylight and clear as the sun in springtime.

"That is a proper honey moon, is it not?" teased Makoto, once the bumbling bits of fur were safe in their houses again. He dipped a ladle into his pail and offered the honey to Milad, who covered his fist in the fragrant harvest and stuck it into his mouth.

Makoto eased the spoon out of Milad's grip and dipped his finger in the honey, licking it clean and shutting his eyes as if he had tasted ambrosia.

"That will be a fine treat for the kitchens," he sighed, pulling the baby into his lap. "Come and taste it,  _ amar _ — _ Haru! _ "

The serving-maidens turned their faces away and burst into giggles, for Haru had taken his portion from the honey on Makoto's lips. Makoto flushed and buried his face in his hands, smiling softly at the peal of mirth that bubbled from Haru's throat. The younger prince bent down to kiss the Qasrian's brow, drawing his head to his shoulder as they lay back to watch the clouds. Milad took little interest in gazing up at the heavens, for the child had been fully entranced by a downy patch of lion's tooth. 

When they went back to the manor for supper they found that nearly half the dishes had been touched by their afternoon’s long labor, for honey flowed like water in Astara and neither stews nor sweetmeats went forth from the kitchens without its sun-coloured sweetness. As the Astarans and the folk from the capital sat at the table together they passed the platters from hand to hand, so that all who had come to the hall to dine could taste whatever they liked. To his astonishment Haru found that the Easterners ate their finest vegetables raw, flavored with salt and a fragrant sauce made of egg-yolks and cream; in the West the better part of their sustenance was preserved to keep it sound, and though he had loved green  _ karnabs  _ in his childhood he had never so much as dreamed of seeing the white leaves whole. Makoto’s spoon passed from bowl to mouth without much pause for marvelling, but Haru set upon each new trencher as if he had fasted for days, emptying dishes of purple carrots cooked to their hearts in butter, snapping bright pods of sugar-peas between his front teeth until his tongue rolled back in protest—

After his father small Milad was surely the gladdest of all the company, for where he had turned up his tiny nose at the salt and pickle of Sahrastan he could scarcely eat his fill of the Astaran fare. Once he had polished the edge from his hunger with river-cod fried with herbs he demanded a bowl of bread and milk, flavored with honey and cardamom plucked that very week from the forests of Jarmah. Haru and Makoto could scarcely fill his small mouth quickly enough to please him, for the moment they fed him a spoonful he gulped and begged at the top of his voice for another. Near the end of the meal the baby found himself glaring between his parents, for fearing that he would not sleep that night they had eased the spoon from his fingers and forbidden the rest from giving him sweetmeats. At last the child poked impatiently at Makoto’s side and dropped his little face into the bowl, gurgling away at the dregs of his milk until Haru cried out and snatched him up in his arms. 

“ _ Milad, _ ” he scolded, taking a kerchief from his pocket to wipe at Milad’s damp cheeks. Milad only squeaked with laughter and licked his nose, well-pleased with the honeyed breadcrumbs he had found at the bottom of the dish. His father plumped him into a heated bath the moment the family returned to their chambers, but not even the dreaded soap and flannel were enough to smother the sunny grin he wore from ear to ear. 

The Sardahanians passed the next five days much as they had passed the first two, traveling from dawn to dusk and resting by night at the gilded estates of the capitals. In every city they took part in the provinces’ labor, losing sight of one another the moment they entered the bright-green cornfields of Marmayah and nearly falling headlong into the River Farzaneh when they joined a fleet of fishing-boats in Orhasova. Their soujourn at the  _ iyaaf’s  _ manor in Jarmah found Haru, Rin, and Momo half-way up an apricot tree, tucking the pale orange fruit into baskets slung round their shoulders before dropping back to the soil where Nagisa and Rei stood waiting. 

It was gladsome work for the princes, and more than once Makoto thought he would like to leave the reins of the court behind and dwell in some lonely Haifan forest with only the toils of a plot of land to trouble him. Haru laughed when he heard of it, taking Makoto’s hands in his and setting his head against the Qasrian’s chest. 

“I do not think we would like it for long, my heart,” he smiled, prying the stone of an apricot from under Milad’s tongue. “There is no use for a prince’s battle-training here, and surely you would miss all the folk at home.”

Makoto stopped and lifted his brows in wonder, for despite the joy that had filled his heart since the marriage-day he could not silence his fear that Haru longed for Sahrastan as he did when he first came to Qasr, smothering his grief at their final parting so as not to trouble his bridegroom. 

“Home,  _ amarya? _ ”

“Do you wish to dwell here then, Makoto?” teased the younger prince, tweaking his husband’s long-lobed ears and giggling like a child when Milad reached up to do the same. “I shall go where you go, my  _ shamsal,  _ from now unto the world’s ending, but still I would miss our own city until you chose to return.”

“Then I shall not stir from it again unless it be by your will,” said Makoto, chortling into Milad’s long hair as they set off to find the others. “Let us go back to the garden, my love, for I fear that Momo has driven Rei out of his wits with the beetles he caught in the thicket.”

*         *         *

The Qasrians came to Martulah at the end of the seventh day, passing the border by twilight and riding forth into a starlit realm that smelt of all the fragrances Haru had ever breathed and a hundred which he had not—lighter and sweeter at once than they were from the phials that held them in Sahrastan, with jasmine and stocks and roses together with their fair wind curling through the open window like incense blown from a shrine. From past the drapes he heard a great slumbering sigh, repeated again and again like the breaths of a sleeping child beyond the brink of the cliff; but ensconced as they were in the painted carriage he could not see to the beach below. Nearly two hours after they crossed the shallow ravine that marked Martulah’s divide from Haifa they turned onto a stone-paved road that led through a quiet city, and then to the gates of the palace where the Queen Natsuko was born. The sandstone  _ alcazar _ was aglow like a torch in the darkness, and save for a twin line of sentries nothing moved in the still soft calm of the grounds. 

“ _ Alia’khayr,  _ Highness,” said the first of the guardsmen, saluting the princes through the curtains before he stepped away to unfold the wooden steps between the two right wheels. Makoto jumped out first with Milad clinging to his chest, looking about the gardens with the eyes of a child whose remembrance had gone untouched by time. In the gloom there was little the Qasrian could see of the tended paths and flowerbeds, but when Haru came forth from the carriage a moment later Makoto turned and pointed to a singing fountain that stood in the high-walled courtyard before the doors. 

“It is just as I recall it,” he whispered, taking his husband’s hand in his and clutching it close to his side. “Rin and I used to play in that fountain with Gou, when we were children.”

Haru gave him no reply save a kiss on his sunbrowned cheek, pressing Makoto’s palm with his own as the garden sighed in the gale. 

“It is the loveliest I have seen of its kind,” he whispered, laughing softly as the rose-leaf mouth turned up in a tender smile. “Shall we go in, my heart?”

As it happened their party had been expected on the morrow, for they had departed the city of Orhasova a day sooner than they were meant to do. The serving man who led them indoors took them first to a pretty dining-chamber, where three of the royal family were sitting together to supper. Makoto grinned and cleared his throat as the doors swung open before him, and in his wake his bridegroom gasped and nearly woke small Milad; the woman at the table had long dark hair and eyes the hue of mallows’ leaves, and save for the lily’s whiteness of her skin he could not have told her from her sister. 

“Makoto!” cried the queen, throwing back her chair and running across the room to take her nephew in her arms. She was perhaps three inches shorter than Natsuko, and narrowly built where the elder of the two was broad in the waist and shoulders. As Haru stood back in the shadows by the curtain he thought of himself and Aki, that though they were twenty and twenty-five his cousin could lift him up as if he were lighter than a sword: the fair crown-prince and his right hand, and told apart as easily as midnight from the dawn. The light in Nabiha’s face was kinder than the flame that burned in her sister’s, and from a glance he knew that it had always been so, for the first had been raised to guard her folk and the second to stand beside her. 

“Aunt Nabiha,” smiled Makoto, setting his chin on Nabiha’s shoulder. She barked a laugh and a sob in one, taking his jaw between her hands and gazing up into his face with tears welling up on her lashes. Behind her a choking cry came from the slender girl at the table, and gathering up her skirts she flew to her mother’s side and sprang onto Makoto’s back. 

“ _ Nii-chan _ ,” she said, clinging fast to Makoto’s neck and weeping into his collar. Haru scarcely kept from falling to the ground at the sight of her, for if not for her grace and the length of her hair he might have mistaken her for Ran. But she was taller by far than the little maid left behind in Sardahan, with fifteen years to Ran’s thirteen, and the pang of homesickness that flared up in Haru’s breast at the thought of Hayato and the twins was not one easily quenched. When she turned her green eyes to Haru he saw again the difference between elder and younger, for the princess Mehrunisa was the first of her house where the Queen had been the last; where the prince Amastan had gone Haru did not know, only that when he was given the throne after Natsuko’s marriage he passed it instead to Nabiha. 

“This is my cousin Mehrun, Haru-chan,” said Makoto, lifting the young girl down from his back and setting her hand in Haru’s. He bent in the Qasrian fashion and kissed it, bringing a peal of laughter from Mehrunisa as she jumped up and down like a hare. 

“Aye, I do not go by my long name at all,” she proclaimed. “It is too dainty for me, and I love the one that Father gave me best.”

“Softly, Mehrun,” called the man at Nabiha’s right. He drew his daughter back with a touch at her elbow and came to stand before Haru, fixing him with a pale-blue gaze that reminded the prince of Lord Aichirou. “It is food and drink to have seen you at last, Haruka, for we spent these last four months reading Natsuko’s letters until it seemed as if we knew you already.”

“That is my husband, Eskandar,” sighed Nabiha, casting a tender look at the prince as he blushed and turned away. “Come here, child—let me see your face, and the little one! I have heard much of you both, and it grieved me greatly that I could not attend your wedding.”

Haru and Makoto spent the next half-hour in the dining room, sitting round the table with Nabiha and Mehrun long after the others had gone to bed. At last Haru fell asleep in his chair with Milad nestled in his lap, whereupon Makoto rose from his place and carried his bridegroom up to the quarters that lord Eskandar had prepared for them. Before the great gong in the entrance hall struck midnight they had changed their robes for tunics and crawled beneath the covers, drawing them up against the chill of the stone as Makoto doused the hanging lamp and plunged the room into darkness.

*         *         *

_ The moment Haru opened his eyes he knew he still lay sleeping, for though he had fallen asleep that night in the warmth of Makoto’s embrace his husband was nowhere to be seen. Instead he found himself in Sardahan again, alone in an chamber draped in red with the northern quarter of the marketplace sparkling beneath his window. He wondered perhaps if he stood in one of the five estates that lay near the city borders, but a moment later he realized it was not so; the crest emblazoned on the mantelpiece was nearly a match for Makoto’s, with the pale white mare of a Qasrian prince before a ground of willows. But still the two sigils were different, and one who knew them well enough could never have mistaken them: Makoto’s bore the image of a silvery  _ bahira,  _ while the picture on the mantel was that of a rearing  _ intisar. 

_ Haru bent close to the polished seal and frowned, for the Eastern glyphs etched round its rim were known to him as well as his own reflection—and by rights they ought not to have been there at all, for though the glyphs spelt Makoto’s name the emblem did not belong to him. He put out a finger and brushed the carven lines of the horse’s forelock, thinking with all his might of where he had seen it last. But before he could grasp at the memory he heard a soft cry from the inner room, high-pitched and muffled and filled with such grief that it smote Haruka to the heart. As the sound came again he turned and went to the curtained door by the balcony, peering into the apartment beyond with the wind caught fast in his lungs.  _

_ The woman kneeling in the bedchamber was not one of the royal house, or at least she shared no blood with the sultan and his children; her hair was nearly as black as Milad’s where Makoto’s was brown, and her nose and chin were sharper by far than the queen’s. But still her face was no stranger to Haru, and when he saw that she had not noticed his presence he crept across the marble tiles until he stood beside her. Her lashes clung to her snow-white cheek as if touched by a sudden shower, and when she raised them Haru fell back with a gasp that rang to the ceilling. _

_ “Who are you?” he demanded, setting a hand upon her shoulder and bowing to face her. His touch passed through the folds of her gown as if they were nothing but shadow, and though he shouted until he was hoarse she would not move to look at him. But still he knew what he had seen, for the eyes behind the swollen lids were familiar to him as the boy upon whom he had glimpsed them last—wide and slanted from side to side and seemingly made for laughter, though from the choking sobs in her throat he feared she might never know laughter again. As he sat staring into her face she rose from the carpet and vanished, dragging the whole of the chamber in her wake so that when Haru’s feet struck the ground again he found himself standing in a long low hall lit only by a brace of smouldering lamps.  _

_ Before him a gilded sepulcher rose nearly to his chest, built of marble like the Sahrastani  _ alcazar _ and set from top to bottom with precious gems that winked and faded in the torchlight like a field of dying stars. He stepped closer to the tomb and swept back the blanket of dust that lay on the lid, wiping the grime away with his palms as he bent to look at the two sigils etched beneath it. A minute later he saw that the first of the two aged blazons was the one he had glimpsed on the mantelpiece, of an  _ intisar  _ before a ground of desert willows. Beside it a second coat of arms stood level with the carven mare, of a lark with a branch of pine between the twin halves of its beak; the leaves were the mark of the Matsuoka clan, Haru knew, but try as he might he could not fathom why one of Rin’s family had been laid to rest with a fallen king of Qasr.  _

_ As he crouched down to look at the name-glyphs of the silent sleepers in the vault the room began to tremble, casting him down to the floor as if to shield the two lines of golden script from his gaze. He had but a minute longer to commit the crest to memory before the catacombs melted like hoarfrost below the dawn, flinging him back to the world of the living and shrouding the crypts in darkness. _

*         *         *

When he woke he found that the curtains were shut, and that though the sunlight fell through them like water the room was dim and still as if the day had not yet risen. Makoto was sitting at the foot of the bed with Milad snoring in his lap, already clad for the morning in a loose green tunic and trousers. Haru rolled out from beneath his pillow and glanced at the windows in bewilderment, wondering why Makoto had let him lie abed so late—and why the drapes had not yet been drawn, for both of the lads were dearly fond of watching the sunrise in their own chambers at home together. 

“Makoto?” he asked, somehow voicing both questions in one with the call. Makoto took Milad in his arms and grasped Haru’s pale hand in his, tugging him up from the blankets and leading him into the washroom. 

“Swiftly, my love,” smiled the elder prince, sitting back on an upturned pail as Haru took a stick of neem between his teeth and chewed the end into a brush. After rinsing his face in the basin he dried his hands and went out into the bedroom, unlacing his sleeping-chemise before donning a shirt and a pair of breeches embroidered in white and blue—and all the while thrilling to the strange sweet urgency that sang through Makoto’s limbs, for though he knew not wherefore nor how his bridegroom was nearly alight with excitement, nearly waking small Milad as he bounced from foot to foot. 

“Where are we going?” asked Haru at last, taking the baby from Makoto and hugging him close to his chest. “And Milad—”

“He shall be mine for the morning,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ ,” came a laugh from the open door, followed by Rei and Nagisa with Momo jumping behind them. “Does that suit you, Haru?”

“Aye,” answered the prince, frowning as Rei came forth for the child. “Makoto,  _ rouhiya _ —”

“Come, sweetheart,” whispered Makoto. To his astonishment Haru found himself swept up into his husband’s arms, cradled between his shoulders as he had been the night Makoto carried him into their quarters in Sardahan—and borne away to the corridor beyond in a heartbeat, as if he weighed nothing at all. But even with Haru’s long legs dangling down to his knee Makoto did not slow his pace, making his way through passage after passage and down the winding stairs until they came to the entrance hall. There he halted and stood on the threshold with bated breath, as if he could not tell what waited behind the doors. 

“Shut your eyes,” he murmured, straining Haru closer still as he covered his face. 

“And now?”

“Hold me tightly, my darling.”

Haru gasped and clutched at Makoto’s shoulders as the warm breeze touched his face, laughing aloud at the tang of the ocean spray. He did not lift his lashes as he felt himself carried into the light, tangling his fingers near Makoto’s neck as his footfalls faded away. But though the sound of open sandals striking tile had gone Makoto had not stopped, taking his bridegroom down a beaten track that snaked round the slanting cliff to the throbbing shore below. 

As he stepped out onto the sand it seemed as if the tides had risen in Haru’s own heart, waking and sighing like the ebb and flow of his blood before rushing back out to sea. Though they were nearly a hundred yards from the water the wind was damp across Haru’s cheeks, mingling with the salt of his tears as Makoto marched on between the heaps of russet stone that had crumbled away from the parapet. At last he halted and set Haru down on the ground, holding fast to his hand as he stood on Makoto’s toes with his eyes shut tight like a child’s. 

“Look now,  _ rouhiya _ .”

For a moment he feared to do it, as if the glory before him might vanish the moment he opened his eyes—but as Makoto bent down to take off his slippers Haruka did the same, turning his face to the sun before gazing upon the water. 

“ _ Makoto _ ,” he cried, and the cry was a sob, torn from his throat like a prayer and offered up like a flame to his husband standing beside him. There before his feet a plain of endless blue lay burning beneath the dawn, tinged with blinding silver dancing off the horizon and reflected again and again so that the skies themselves were mirrored upon the water. 

It was more akin to the desert than Haru had hoped to see in the East, for the waves that rose and fell in the  _ Bahrayn _ were a match for the sighing dunes of Sahrastan, crowding one after another so that Haru could scarcely tell their crests from their tails. The whole of it looked like a  _ sak’aku _ , he thought—where for the heat the heavens lent their beauty to the earth, setting dry sand and dust ablaze to shine like a pool by moonlight. As Haru stood gaping Makoto relinquished his grasp on his bridegroom’s hand, laughing at the top of his voice as the Iwatobian took in a breath and flung himself headlong into the sea. 

*         *         *

The princes did not return to the palace that day, for after they had wearied themselves with swimming back and forth along the pier a manservant came to the beach with their luncheon in a basket. Though Haru had spent nearly half an hour keeping watch for Nagisa and Rei neither of of the two had set so much as a toe on the path leading down to the shore, and as the attendant bowed and made to take his leave he stopped the lad and asked where the rest of the party had gone. 

“Your steward and his bridegroom remained with the Queen and Princess in the halls of lore, my lord,” came the reply. “The little one is in their care, and the rest of your countrymen have gone to the strand on the northern face of the cliff.”

With that he bowed and departed, leaving Haru and Makoto to spread their faded tarpaulin in the shade of a bayberry tree and break their fast with the fare that Mehrun had sent them. After their dishes were empty they set the basket aside and went to the far end of the dock, where a salt-stained rowboat sat bobbing up and down in the cool of the darkness beneath. Makoto set a hand on the weathered piling and vaulted into the hull, nearly overturning the thing on Haru’s head before he seized the oars to keep himself upright. The younger prince sprang back before jumping in beside his husband, watching with interest as he took hold of the paddles and turned the little vessel towards the eastern bluffs that lay at the opposite fringe of the beach. 

“You row it well, my love,” said Haru, looking up into the Qasrian’s face. “Where did you learn to manage a rowboat so in Sardahan?”

“Not in Sardahan, sweetheart,” smiled Makoto. “My grandmother on Father’s side was born in Astara, and when I was a lad I went with him often to visit her kin at the Lady Soraya’s court. There was a great lake near the southern border of the province, and Mother taught me to row there. She learned to do it on the sea, and not even the best of Martulah’s fishermen could have shown me better.”

For a while they sailed without speaking save to laugh at the colored fish that darted past them below, for both of the princes had fallen to the breathless spell that each wrought so fully on the other. Makoto scarcely knew whether he was sailing toward the cliff or out past the bank of the reef, and only the old recollection of his childhood haven in the parapet kept the boat on its course—for his eyes did not leave his bridegroom’s face, and under the warmth of his tender gaze Haru blushed from brow to chin like the ocean by sunset. 

“ _ Rouhiy _ ,” he murmured, burning crimson as Makoto’s hands went slack on the padded oars. “Why do you look at me so,  _ jaanya? _ ”

“Ought I to turn away from one such as you, my  _ shamsal? _ ” whispered Makoto, rising from the plank where he sat to take his beloved in his arms. Haru nearly fell back at the gentle touch, straining his husband close to his chest until not so much as a breeze could have passed between them. The oars lay forgotten as their faces met in a kiss, leaving them deaf and blind to the roaring sighs of the water and the shrieks of the gulls near the shore. Haru could not have stirred from Makoto’s embrace if it meant his death to remain, and careless of the  _ kharib’s  _ rocking he caught hold of the Qasrian’s jacket and drew him nearer still. Makoto stumbled and fell as a wave struck the vessel on its prow, chuckling as Haru raised his palms to his shoulders to cushion the blow. They did not part until nearly a quarter-hour had passed, casting them adrift for want of a hand on the paddles—but at long last they lay breathless in the bottom of the skiff, laughing up at the open sky like a pair of children as they floated back to the shore. 

“Oh, Goddess!” cried Makoto, springing up with Haru still clasped to his breast. “ _ Asif,  _ Haru-chan—I meant to take you to the cove—”

“It matters nothing,  _ shin’ainaru-ko _ ,” answered Haru, setting his cheek against Makoto’s collar. “I would kiss you to my heart’s content in a boat as well as a cove, and you know it as well as I do.”

“Aye, I do,” teased the elder prince, swooping down to kiss him again as the boat moved off toward the parapet again. “But I would not have you lose the chance to see the  _ bahr-kahf,  _ my darling, no matter how dearly I wish to keep you close.”

With that he picked up the oars and rowed with all his might, so that scarcely five minutes later they came to a rent in the face of the cliff and a half-drowned beach no longer than the southern wall of their bedchamber. Makoto tugged the boat into the cave and tied its long rope about a pillar of stone, jumping out of the skiff the moment it stilled and lifting Haru down behind him. In the cool of the  _ bahr-kahf  _ the water was cool and clear, hardly stirring with the waves beyond and smooth as a stretch of glass. The sand beneath their feet shone here and there as if the rock beneath had been touched by a vein of starlight, drawing a delighted gasp from Haru’s lips at the sight of it. 

“ _ Rayie,  _ Makoto,” breathed Haru, taking the calloused hand in his and following its keeper past the glittering rock. As they made their way through the cave its deep-blue mouth disappeared in the shadows behind them, but their path was bright with the sunbeams that fell through the moss-green vents in the sandstone above. Makoto knew his way well enough, for even when they walked in the dark he led his beloved in his wake so that he would not fall. As the tide went out the empty skiff sank down to rest on the sand, waiting in silence for the bright-eyed princes to return—but though the sun had crossed the heavens to hang like a torch above the western horizon neither of the lads had come near the boat again. 

The shades of evening were black in the sky when they took their leave of the  _ bahr-kahf _ , worn and weary and wet to the skin in tunics that smelt of salt. After they came to the sandbar they cast off their sodden robes and dragged their boat through the shallows, climbing aboard and punting away as soon as the water was deep enough to float in. Haru lay back on Makoto’s shoulder and fell asleep in an instand, leaving his husband to heft the paddles and row them back to shore. It was lighter work than it seemed, for tired though he was the vessel was slightly built and carried nothing but themselves. As they drifted on with the current a fleet of pearly moonbeams trailed behind them like a school of merry silverfish, streaming along by the rounded stern as if it pleased them to swim there—if only so they might learn the beauty of Haru’s gentle face, as wholesome and fair as a summer fruit as he slumbered on through the darkness. For a moment the Qasrian stilled the oars and looked down at the youth in his lap, breathing a sigh at the boundless gift the hours had been to them—dearer than most, he thought, and yet he was sure that a sweeter one would come to be theirs before long. 

When they returned to their quarters in the  _ alcazar  _ Haru nearly slept through his bath, and only Makoto’s hand at his neck kept him from slipping and striking his head on the tub. Once they were dried and dressed they stumbled back to their bedchamber where Milad had lain for an hour or longer, snoring softly in the middle of the eiderdown with Rei keeping watch beside him. The young healer laughed and took his leave as they entered, dousing the lamps that burned on the nightstand as he vanished into the corridor. The princes surrendered to their dreams the moment he had gone, and none of the others saw them again until well past noon the next day. 

*         *         *

When Haru awoke he found that dawn had not yet come; indeed, it was many hours off, for the night was blacker than pitch in the deep stark void of the heavens. Makoto lay swathed in the fine linen sheet, and Milad in his ruffled nightshirt was tucked safely between his two guardians. Haru pushed back his long hair with a sigh, wondering what had roused him—certainly it was neither husband nor child who stirred him from sleep, for both the elder prince and the little one were breathing so softly that he could scarcely hear them at all. 

At length he turned away from Milad’s small face nestled close beneath Makoto’s, rising from the bed and pushing his feet into woolen slippers as he looked at the door to the balcony. The panes were thrown back to let in the darkness beyond, as Makoto had left them before they retired: with the white muslin drapes tangling together in the breeze, and the soft calm pulse of the sinking tide ebbing up from the beach below. Haru pulled the covers over Milad’s back and went softly out to the terrace, gazing past the pearly shore to the moon’s pale reflection on the water... until the sound that had broken his dreams rose up to his ear once again, waxing and falling with the rushing waves as he searched in vain for its source. At last his eyes lit upon the figure of a girl perched alone on a boulder half-buried in sand—a slender phantom sitting with her toes dangling down to the surf, playing an Eastern pipe as if to lull the sea to slumber. From the dull black sheen of her curls he knew the maid at once: Makoto’s young cousin, the princess Mehrunisa. As she lingered on the outcrop Haru remained on the ledge above, wondering in silence how the child was so plainly Natsuko’s kin—

“Aye, we two are more alike than she knows,” came a voice from beside him, startling the prince from his musings as he turned to face his companion. His hands darted forth to the railing to keep him upright, for it was not his husband who had followed him onto the balcony, but a dark-haired woman clad in a robe of white and silver, looking down at the girl on the shore with the moonlight reflected in her eyes. For a moment he nearly fled in terror, certain that his guest had returned from the dead like the haunts in Aki’s stories, but there was no look of death about her: only the flush of youth where youth was far behind the woman he knew, and it was this that had so perplexed him. 

“No, Haru-chan,” she laughed, tilting her face as she smiled—just as Makoto did, and struck nearly speechless by the sight he stopped and stared at the rosy flush of her skin. If he dared put a hand on her arm he knew that the warmth of living flesh would meet his fingers, and so he drew back to the balustrade as the shade of an older Queen laid her elbows on the rail and gazed out over the sea. 

“What are you doing here?” he breathed at last, pinching his wrist until a pair of welts bloomed under his palm like roses. “Surely you are not—”

“No,” she agreed. “I am alive and well—at least as I must be now, at the other palace in Sardahan. But  _ I  _ have been here all the while, for I belong to the East, and we two shall never be parted so long as it shines under Heaven.”

Haru studied the girl with a frown, deciding that she was perhaps two or three years further than twenty, and nearly a quarter-century younger than the gentle queen of Qasr as she was when he saw her last. 

“It is beautiful, is it not?” she smiled, laying a hand on her cheek as she reached for the thorny blossoms curling in wreaths round the doorframe. He nearly cried out in warning, but though the stem was studded with barbs she plucked an open flower and bound it into her plait without breaking her snow-white skin. “Save for the grace of my father-in-law you might never have seen it so, for twenty-five years ago these shores were flowing with blood.”

“What do you mean?” he asked. Natsuko turned her sea-green eyes to his and sighed, pointing at the silent horizon as if by doing so she might bring the memory to life. 

“There is land beyond those waters,  _ radhiy _ ,” she said. “We knew nothing about it for many years, for past the great reef the sea is wide and treacherous, and always our fishing boats have stayed within sight of the sandbar. But twenty-five summers ago a great typhoon struck the city, and in its wake there came a black fleet of corsairs driven out of the East. To this day I do not know where their country lies, nor how it was that they spoke our tongue—only that they were a fierce and cruel people, for upon crossing the ridge they pillaged the citadel and left our villages burning before making away with their plunder..”

The apparition fell silent and glanced back at her son-in-law, drawing a breath of the salt-sweetened air before she spoke again. 

“We had not the strength to guard our soil alone,” whispered the queen, and from the soft lilt of her voice the prince knew that her grief was still as fresh as ever. “There was no army to speak of save the men and women who practiced swordplay for art, and so my father sent an envoy to the sultan of Qasr pleading for aid. Lord Annis gave it without question, sending three hundred regiments from the provinces to aid us, and so the corsairs were overcome and our coastlines freed from their filth.

“And for payment he took my hand on behalf of his son, for after the crown prince Makoto’s passing his brother nearly faded from sorrow. The sultan would never have thought of wedding his child to a maid outside his court, but when he saw me—from the moment of my birth I was meant to govern Martulah, and he saw it in my bearing, for I myself had been among the few who fought the devils before his armies came to the east. He was certain his kingdom would flourish in my hands, and so he told my parents that he sought a bride for his son.

“So it was that Martulah lost its sovereign Queen,” she cried, and the lament rolled on through the night like a swift cast out from its eyrie. “Lost, Haru-chan—gone beyond recall, and  _ I _ —”

But she did not weep, and at the sharp gleam in her eye Haru recalled the first night of the autumn festival seven moons previously and Natsuko clad in green and violet, invoking the rise and fall of rolling waters with the skirts of her gown, the petals of woodland flowers with the oil on her curling lashes, and the sandstone of a palace set high above the shore with the palms of her long-fingered hands. He knew her sorrow as he knew his own, for even after his wedding he dreamed now and then of his childhood, and the night Iwatobi burned like a torch beneath the cold light of the stars. If such a fate were to rise in the West again he could do nothing to spare it, having surrendered his place in the royal house with his marriage—for though his cousin would surely call for aid a sixteen days’ journey lay between them, and the kingdom might sink into ash before Haru was given the news. 

“Nay,” he breathed. He took her white hands in his and stared up into her face, finding to his wonder that the path before him was clear, and the agony gone from his heart and hers as if the heavens had willed it. “Never again, I swear it! for I am crown prince of Sardahan, and I shall guard Martulah from ruin if I must give my life to make it so! The West has passed beyond me now, but still if the need is at hand I will go at the army’s head to defend the East, and keep it from harm while there is breath in my body.”

She shuddered at the promise as if its weight was nearly too heavy to bear, laughing like a zephyr in springtime once she had heard it fully. To Haru’s ear her merry voice rang like a bell, until he was certain that he had heard it before from the throat of a silver-haired Queen with eyes as blue as the ocean, and then from his own mother’s lips as if from out of a dream—echoing up from the Goddess’s temple at prayer, and  _ then— _

He shouted in wonder at the knowledge that struck him next, for Natsuko trembled and vanished as if his oath had released her, and though the light shone full on the cove where he took his luncheon that morning he saw that a single moonbeam had gone astray—skimming over the water until it found the horizon, and yet some shade of its grace lingered on in his heart like a lantern lit from within. The solemn piping of Mehrun’s flute still sang forth from the beach, and at the sweet sound he turned on his heel and shut the twin doors behind him. Makoto stirred without waking as he slipped back under the covers, drawing his bridegroom close to his side as slumber took them anew. 

The next day they found the broken stem and wondered what might have touched it, for neither Haru nor Makoto dared lay a finger on the plant for fear of the spines that lined the green flesh of its leaves. Haru frowned and shook his head at the sight, certain he ought to recall where the lone flower had gone—but still its meaning escaped him, and though night after night the princess’s music rose up to color his dreams it never woke him again. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everybody! 
> 
> First and foremost, a huge huge THANK YOU to everyone who stayed with me so long (almost a year!) and left comments and kudos to help me along. This story could never have been finished without your wonderful feedback, and I am so glad to have met all the amazing people I got to know through writing it. The biggest shoutout goes to alsas, who helped me with brainstorming time and again and looked over all the chapters before I published them--and made such beautiful artwork that it inspired me to keep writing and bringing Sped by Flame to you all! I love you so much, and I can't wait to work with you again!!!
> 
> Secondly: As I already announced on my tumblr, a sequel (A Raven Calls in Qasr) should be up within the next few weeks to a month, following our characters' adventures several years in the future. But before that, expect an epilogue for this story, in which one love story is settled and another begins ;) It should be out in early September!
> 
> And that's all for now! <3 I hope you enjoyed, and thank you so much for reading! ^_^
> 
> -GodmotherToClarion


End file.
